Dry bulk is both fun and frustrating, says Sigrid Teig, commercial director at PortLog, a predictive analytics technology platform designed to reduce time spent in port.
Teig will be speaking at May’s Geneva Dry summit in a workshop looking at how to make data actionable.
“With such a strong roster, I look forward to learning how we can hone-in even better on solving the dry bulk-specific challenges of maritime supply chains,” she says of the forthcoming global commodities shipping event.
“The large degree of underlying trade heterogeneity and fragmentation is what makes dry bulk such a fun segment to work in, and for the exact same reasons all the more frustrating – and rewarding – to solve for as a vendor,” Teig says in a frank interview.
Customers want fewer solutions and user interfaces
At Geneva Dry there will be a whole afternoon devoted to digital, something Teig is keen to participate in.
When speaking to clients within the dry bulk space she finds two themes persist: integration and enablement.
“Customers want fewer solutions and user interfaces, importantly to reduce the adoption load on end-users,” she says.
At the same time, Teig reckons customers have an ever-growing appetite to leverage data in daily decision-making, which translates into demand for integrated solutions.
The customers’ pursuit of enablement is derived from their ambition to improve collaboration across departments, as well as reducing friction in repetitive transactions between themselves and their counterparts, she explains.
“The ability to connect – dare I say, bust – silos of data or workflows, whether internally or externally, is incredibly more difficult to do than to state as an ambition,” Teig admits.
Return on investment is increasingly a topic Teig sees customers being focused on. “The days of buying into shiny new objects without a clear line of sight on financial or process benefits seems to be fading,” she says.
Geneva Dry will kick off on May 2 with an hour on digital efficiency drivers with top names from Oldendorff Carriers and Cetus Maritime among the speakers followed by a workshop on making data actionable and finishing with what promises to be a lively debate on the future of fixing, moderated by Mandarin Shipping’s Tim Huxley with well known names from the likes of Bahri, Lauritzen Bulkers and Arrow as panellists.
Designed to be the annual global summit for the dry bulk shipping community, the event now boasts an extraordinary mix of shipowners, trading companies, miners and tech providers, with more than 150 companies due to convene at the Hotel President Wilson on the shores of Lake Geneva.
The high-level summit is split into relevant sectors to make delegates’ time more targeted and rewarding. Sessions also include minor bulks; agri-commodities; coal; iron ore; and decarbonisation.
The full Geneva Dry agenda can be accessed here.
Geneva Dry registration, at just $650, can be accessed here.
Special Geneva Dry rates at the President Wilson Hotel can be found here.
