Vessel Performance Management Systems: How a Commercial Company uses Metrics to Reduce Total Ownership Costs

摘要

While the cost effective management of commercial ships is a holistic process using marine engineering and technology, innovation, and management of the regulatory environment, one commercial maritime company, Maersk Line, is achieving new levels of efficiency and dramatically reducing total ownership costs through the implementation of a vessel performance management system (VPMS). This system uses a matrix of key performance indicators (KPI's) driven by normalization algorithms that are fed by remote sensors and regular automatic and manual reports. The KPI's are then further processed to a resultant overall shipboard efficiency rating whereby ships can be compared and competed within a class and a fleet, and multiple fleets can be competed against each other using similar normalized efficiency ratings. By stressing responsibility and accountability through these efficiency ratings, management is able to improve fleet and individual vessel performance. The resulting improvement in performance and increased efficiency has directly led to dramatically lower fleet operating costs. Therefore, a vessel performance management system is allowing management to tap into and influence the human behavioral and cultural factors that can be the most effective, but often more elusive organizational keys to lowering total ownership costs.