THE SMART YACHT

Integrated systems controlling every electrical device on board, along with systems to monitor your yacht from home, are among the latest developments. reports

Elaine Bunting

Marine electronics have become increasingly sophisticated, driven by advances in networking technology and the intuitive user interfaces we have come to expect from everyday devices. A decade ago, a chartplotter showed charts and was used primarily for navigation; today’s powerful touchscreen multifunction displays (MFDS) provide information that ranges from charts to radar display, cameras, sonar and much more. We are well on the way to the fully connected, fully integrated smart yacht.

Improving the experience of using networked systems is a big focus for electronics companies in their next stages of product development, as they seek to make operating a yacht – and monitoring it from afar – much more like the experience already found in luxury cars.

Being fully integrated

Alan Davis, product line director at B&G, says that there are “two pieces that are key to what we are doing and will continue to do: integration and ease of use.

“I can sit in my kitchen, see where I want to go and when I get in my car it connects and knows where I want to go. It’s one seamless, integrated experience and that’s the bit that the marine industry has been lacking for some time,” he says.

“But,” he adds, “the software needs to be much more integrated in how you transition