A new decade is just around the corner and the key focus in 2020 for businesses across all industries is sustainability. The marine sector, in particular, is taking sustainability seriously with the introduction of IMO 2020. In 2017, the maritime industry consumed 3.8 million barrels per day of fuel oil, which equates to half of global fuel oil demand. IMO 2020 regulations will see the largest reduction in the sulphur content of a transportation fuel undertaken at one time. As vital as these changes are, sustainability extends beyond clean energy and requires fundamental shifts in how organizations work.
The vast majority of transactions in the shipping industry are still paper-based and passes through a host of different parties via email. In a study carried out in 2014, Maersk found that just a simple shipment of refrigerated goods from East Africa to Europe goes through nearly 30 people with more than 200 different communications among them, generating nearly 6,000 messages due to the cc’ email effect.
Storing information associated with a voyage is often done by using a document management system and printing the attached files along with the emails that accompany them. In fact, SEDNA has met with shipping organizations who have rooms or even an entire floor of an office building dedicated to the storage of printed documents. According to IBM, the costs associated with the document processing and administration are estimated to be up to one-fifth of the actual physical transportation costs.
We believe SEDNA is a solution to help organizations optimize workflow and become more sustainable.
By Significantly Reducing Email Volume, SEDNA’s Team-Based Inbox Minimizes the Proliferation of Information for Printing
Personal email systems were never designed for business transactions that include negotiations, content management, and collaboration with multiple parties. SEDNA creates one email address for each team, such as [email protected], and a shared inbox for them to access. Instead of forwarding or copying team members on critical messages and the subsequent chain of responses and internal discussion, all users work from the single, original copy of the message. Every attachment, tag, and comment are held in one place, delivering transparency, accountability, and efficiency, while significantly reducing the volume of emails.
Keep Everything in One Place Using Flexdocs, Cloud-Based Information Governance
We believe email is the first system of record, as it is often the initial place to receive and send information. Using the power of a team, SEDNA’s “Flexdocs” functionality allows anyone within the organization to tag attachments associated to a vessel. Because the system is cloud-based, organizations can store unlimited documents, without the requirement to continually print the most up-to-date version. When composing an email, the “Flexdocs” feature allows the sender to quickly find and email a package of information associated to a vessel from anywhere at anytime.
Visibility Throughout the Lifecycle of a Transaction Mitigates Risk and Improves Security
An article from Forbes magazine highlights the vast amount of resources wasted due to inefficient and error-prone manual processes in shipping workflows and the need for streamlining and standardizing information flows using digital solutions. Instead of sending more emails, organizations that use SEDNA can collaborate with team members by tagging people or adding comments directly to a single message. SEDNA delivers a shared system of record and visibility into the lifecycle of a transaction. Through our APIs, SEDNA connects to other technologies that shipping organizations rely upon to streamline the flow of information. This enables auto-tagging, and our smart system can then filter messages to ensure people receive the most relevant information to them at the top of their inbox.
By adopting SEDNA, organizations can reduce or even eliminate the need to print out documents associated with the fixture of a vessel, improve the communication amongst people involved in a transaction, and deliver a more efficient way for organizations to run their business. To learn in more detail how SEDNA can help your company become more sustainable, download our whitepaper.