Harbour Mastery Inc
Harbour Mastery® Inc.: Robust ERP System for Seaport Management in the Cloud

With the ever-changing business dynamics and increasing consumer pressures, the maritime industry is undergoing major and rapid transformation. This highly competitive global environment faces major challenges ranging from heightened security and regulatory requirements to need for rapid and efficient intermodal connectivity. In this environment that manages 85 percent of world trade, many organizations are seeking to minimize diverse legacy approaches and embrace innovative, integrated solutions that streamline their business—ultimately enhancing overall productivity. “Seaports are increasingly adopting cloud solutions to manage their operations and increase productivity and flexibility, to replace ‘on premise mainstream’ Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) solutions that in fact limit their potential,” begins M. George Walters, President, Harbour Mastery. With a mission to deliver interoperable IT solutions in the cloud, that address the need for unique approaches to manage both maritime traffic and finance, along with security, is Tampa, FL based Harbour Mastery® Inc. founded in 2003.

Since 2007 the company has partnered with NetSuite® to create i-Seaports ERP vertical to meet language, currency, and international trade requirements. “i-Seaports enables seaports to integrate all their processes and information on a single platform, providing visibility across their operations and eliminating redundancy of effort when running multiple systems that do not integrate well with each other,” says Walters. On the NetSuite platform, i-Seaports enables ports to quickly deploy a system that solves problems which have plagued them for decades. “With i-Seaports, ports can simplify, improve, and focus on their core business, identify and act to close operational inefficiencies and lost revenue gaps,” he adds. “Seaports can partner with their customers real-time and on line to achieve better value for both.” i-Seaports also leverages NetSuite services such as fixed asset management and detailed worker and employee payroll management. The NetSuite ERP Software as a Service (SaaS) platform also addresses major challenges around cyber-security, scalability, and reliability that CIOs face, making it a preferred Platform as a Service (PaaS).

With i-Seaports, ports can simplify, improve, and focus on their core business, identify and act to closeoperational inefficiencies and lost revenue gaps.

The agile NetSuite platform allows Harbour Mastery to deliver customizable seaport solutions based on a client’s requirements. For instance, Tampa Port Authority engaged with Harbour Mastery to provide a custom solution for their daily operations, vessel and cargo scheduling, billing, lease management, and financial management. This included a complicated Minimum Annual Guarantee (MAG) system that integrated with their leases. The Harbour Mastery team effectively met the complex vessel scheduling and financial billing and accounting needs of the client. Most recently Canaveral Port Authority has adopted the solution developed for Tampa and is extending its capabilities.

Further, Harbour Mastery also enables marinas to streamline their operations with its NetSuite based offering, i-Marinas. “i-Marinas ERP is engineered to meet the unique needs of public and private marinas, yacht clubs, and small boat harbors,” adds Walters. It is designed to support the hospitality industry as many marinas are also the sites for campgrounds, RV parks, restaurants and stores.

As a Solution Development Partner (SDN), Harbour Mastery meets the Built-for-NetSuite (BFN) certification requirements “Going forward, we expect to continue providing NetSuite channel sales and partners a way to add seaports and marinas to their portfolios with Harbour Mastery as subject matter experts,” says Walters. Harbour Mastery’s vision for the future remains: “To create affordable world class seaport and marina management solutions affordable to ports of any size and eliminate the ‘niche’ market mentality that has kept this out of reach for many.”