May 21, 2021

Launches new software business model

Optilift prepares to offer its customer a service-solution for its automated crane and cargo handling software.

With the new software service- and payment model, customers may subscribe to the various software solutions from Optilift instead of purchasing the technology. The flexibility enables customers to activate the subscription when access to the software is needed and deactivate it when the system is not in use.

Camilla Nylund, Managing Director of Optilift, says the subscription option will reduce initial investments for the customers, and thereby make the Optilift products more easily available to a wider audience.

– With this strategy we lower the barrier for implementing our sensor-based systems related to Lifting Support and Digital Logistics. Consequently, our customers will only be invoiced for the duration the system is in active use and provides the necessary benefits to the customer, says Nylund.

New model

The software systems include lifting support with improved safety and efficiency in various weather conditions and logistics- and deck planning with container tracking functionalities. Although subscription-based solutions for software packages are not yet commonplace in the offshore sector, Nylund thinks it will be welcomed by the industry.

– Offshore companies are becoming more and more focused on cost efficiency in operations, and this is our response to that request, says Nylund.

Reduced hardware price

The subscription model will also be available on Optilift´s hardware; a sensor technology that has the same capabilities as a boom tip camera-, but with the software modules that monitors deck to achieve safer and more efficient lifting operation, alerts if there are people near the lifting zone and that enable cargo tracking to achieve a digital twin of the offshore installations in real time. Nylund expects that the pricing strategy will lead to an increase in sensor demand as the benefits within safety and efficiency of offshore lifting and logistics are great compared to the relatively small investment.

– We have re-designed and improved the sensor unit, making it smaller, smarter and less expensive. When we introduce it to the market in the fall 2021, it will be with a reduced cost of 60-70 percent, and with software licensing cost according to actual use, says Nylund.

– In addition to a reduced hardware cost we have simplified the installation concept, which means that the job can be done by the customer´s own electrical personnel in one or two work shifts only. I expect that these improvements of our products will make them even more attractive to a larger group of customers, both offshore and onshore, says Nylund.