Entech&Semar which is one the important company and providing spare parts and maintenance services to maritime industry in Turkey headed to innovative technologies with its new investment NovuMare. NovuMare, which engages in the fields of layered production, IoT, unmanned / autonomous systems, artificial intelligence and Blockchain, aims to be an international brand that produces the technologies of the future with completely domestic resources.
Entech & Semar, which is Turkey’s leading supplier of spare parts and maintenance company, attracts attention with its investments in innovative technologies. The company, which has been serving the maritime sector since 2007, has also added innovative technologies to its engineering and consultancy, spare parts supply, maintenance and repair services which it has maintained for many years.
The company, investing in the future, carries out important studies in the fields of artificial intelligence, unmanned and autonomous technologies, blockchain, IoT and 3D additive production with the NovuMare brand established with its own capital. The company, which invests in the future, carries out important studies in the field of artificial intelligence, unmanned and autonomous technologies, blockchain, IoT and 3D additive manufacturing with the NovuMare brand established with its own capital. This initiative, which started by Entech & Semar co-founder and general manager Semih Ege, aims to make significant contributions to the domestic technology move.
NovuMare, which is committed to being a producer and a leader beyond being an observer and a practitioner, is currently undertaking remarkable projects on unmanned surface and underwater vehicles in the fields such as tools, artificial intelligence and layered production which are frequently on the agenda in maritime as in all fields with the developing technology. We talked details of these studies and future plans with CEO Semih Ege and CTO Omer Berkay Dagli of the NovuMare.
Could you give us brief information about NovuMare and its establishment purpose?
Novu means new in Latin. Mare also refers to the sea, as you understand, we have named this dream as “New Sea”. Why new? Nowadays, technology is developing very rapidly and this case causes devastating changes in every sector. Developments such as artificial intelligence supported systems, sniffing drones, underwater autonomous devices and even autonomous commercial vessels are penetrating our sector more closely in this regard. Many operations are stripped of the necessity of human labor and become a state where man is the only control mechanism. When exactly does this happen? Maybe 20 years later, 30 years later, maybe 5 years later. Information networks that have become widespread thanks to the globalization of the world and the Internet, change every activity in our sector. For example, what do we do as Entech & Semar? We engage in spare parts work, ship machinery maintenance and repair. We provide ship building services and design services for retrofits.
Spare part and ship machinery maintenance and repair activities, which we have 12 years of experience, constitute a significant portion of our revenue. However even these activities have to keep up with change. That’s why we develop our own software, and strengthen our operations with the latest technology products such as high-resolution 3D scanners. This necessity of integration and compliance showed us that we need to produce technological innovations. Therefore, we established NovuMare by allocating a significant budget to R & D. We would like to bring our sector into a powerful sector that catches the age producing these technologies in Turkey. I would like to add that by its nature, NovuMare aims to share and support information as much as it produces. We are in close contact with maritime schools within this framework. We frequently organize activities with the students and try to raise their awareness. We also encourage and support them in producing projects. 70 percent of our staff is students; they continue their education in their schools and strive to produce information here. The only need of our young people is to provide them with opportunities and we are trying to realize their dreams.
What are the studies done here? What stage are you at?
Here we are working on 5 basic technologies; layered production, IoT, unmanned / autonomous systems, artificial intelligence and Blockchain. We have different projects where we integrate all of example, we have recently reached the testing stage for unmanned watercraft, we will perform water tests. We need to see compliance with environmental conditions and operations. Our autonomous underwater studies continue. We have obtained the design registrations of all these works. Although we are a young company, we already have one patent and three design registrations thanks to information that we have produced. Moreover, these projects are fully based on domestic resources and where these resources are not enough; we plan it to be as our own production. Another project is the sniffing drone. The gases emitted from the vessels have to be limited in certain proportions due to the increasing environmental rules in recent days. While the vessel is navigating, we are working on a drone that approaches the vessel and takes a sample of the flue gas, is capable of measuring on the air and reporting it to the center. This project is planned to come to an end in the second half of 2020. The software and analysis systems for the drone will be completely native. Besides, we have an automation study on chemical analysis and improvement system of vessel boilers. This is a study of boiler and HT / LT systems used in vessels for various purposes. Water in these systems causes corrosion. Various chemicals are required to prevent corrosion. The system we developed takes samples from water and analyzes its chemical structure. Based on the analysis, the artificial intelligence-supported system adds chemicals to the water in line with the values and reports simultaneously. At present, these analyze and preventive chemicals are applied by the officers, while in our system everything is done automatically and allows intervention from the land office.
Does the implementation of automation require a change in the existing boiler system on board? What will be the advantages of the system?
Automation can be integrated without any change in the existing boiler system. We adapt this to the boiler system using existing connections. The system will carry out measurements by taking samples from the water in the boiler at regular intervals. It will report the measurement results to both machine officers and the office on land. The most important advantage is the ability to intervene on land. We take into account the connection of land and vessels in everything we do. Sales and service of the system will be provided by us. We can only give suggestions about the chemicals to be used. Because every chemical has values and reactions. Therefore, we will only make suggestions.
You said that you also have studies on the underwater watercraft; can you explain that a little bit?
This is an underwater imaging device. However are similar products of foreign origin in this regard. But there is no local company that makes them available to the end user. The purpose is to provide an underwater imaging device that can serve anyone who wants. We’re designing a remote-controlled device with a 100-meter cable. The field of application covers a wide range from underwater surveys to underwater documentaries. We can say that it will be very advantageous considering the costs of products abroad. The biggest feature of us is that we do not supply parts from abroad. We produce the parts we need ourselves using the production experience and technical infrastructure of Entch & Semar in NovuMare. This not only helps us to reduce costs but also provides a significant advantage in the sales price of the product.
Do you finance your work yourself? Do you have any support?
We finance our work with our equity capital. The supports we receive are very small. We invest the earnings in technology as I just mentioned. Actually, the return period of this investment is quite long. We started in 2018, we will be able to launch a full product in the whole of 2019, and maybe in the middle of 2020. However main gain of us is knowledge, our intellectual property and the added value that we create. Therefore, we will continue to move towards R & D. We do not want to be the only implementers of technological developments. We set out to become a manufacturer of these technologies and we will continue to work confidently on this path.
What is your future vision?
Four projects of us that we are actively conducting at NovuMare are underwater imaging equipment, overwater unmanned watercraft, sniffing drone and boiler systems. Of course we have thoughts on the shelf. These studies also require great budgets for sure. As our opportunities develop, we will increase our investments and strive to turn our dreams into products. Our greatest desire is to share our added value with our sector and to support our young brothers who have devoted themselves to maritime in the meantime. We originally planned this structure as different branches specialized under Novu Technology. This includes NovuMare -New Sea- NovuIgnis, Novu Tera, and Novudies. So we planned it as land, sea, air and space. Our dreams and desire are to develop these technologies locally and to ensure Turkey to have voice in technology by creating both universal and local added values.
