Startup company visit: Windward\Tamar Nitzan

Windward is a service-based startup (est. 2009) that offers strategy planning based on expertise and data science. Its clients receive strategic direction based on captured, cleaned and analyzed maritime data (+AI). The goal- safer seas and helping the maritime ecosystem thrive.

Speaker: Mr. Omer Primor – Head of Marketing

Publicity, customer understanding, branding

There are 80k-120k container ships at sea at all times.

The maritime ecosystem main “players”:

- Commodity traders

- Ship brokers

- Banks

- Shipowners

- Bunkering (fuel)

- Terminal

- Governments

- Insurance

These are Windward’s clients and potential clients.

“Delivering decision-ready data.”

Combatting criminal behavior at sea:

Targeting vessels to check based on profiling (intelligence).

only catches 22%

Spotting anomalies (sudden changes in behavior).

Behavior Analytics: using Machine Learning classifiers.

Predictive Models: labeled data + features through modeling.

Trust-based interaction with clients. TRUST = COMPETENCY + EMPATHY

Past: At the start, Windward’s founders were trying to combat piracy using small pilot-less aircrafts. Shortly after realizing this idea wasn’t ideal, The satellite that reads ships’ signals hits the market. The original idea wasn’t a “winner”, but they were looking in the right place at the right time.

Future: short term – more of the same. Long term – “same same but different”. The environment and industry are changing constantly so maintain relevancy is and will always be the main goal. Ideally – Windward strives to become the standard.

“Crossing the Chasm” – Windward is currently crossing the gap between “early adopters” and “early majority”.

Q: Where does the data come from? How do you have access to it?

A: Data is either bought from suppliers or gathered using predictive modelling. Open to the public data - news, accident reports. No use of proprietary data.

Q: Theoretical situation: One of your client’s vessels is flagged by your system for illicit behavior – what’s your protocol?

A: It’s a challenge – people are more anecdotal then predictory. That’s why trust is key.

Q: How do you think the world is going to look in 5 years? (regarding AI)

A: Humans will always be needed. Intuition, for instance, is a “human thing”. That being said, we need AI because we tend to be anecdotal – to our detriment.