Transcript

Decarbonizing Global Shipping: How a Nature-Inspired Hardware Solution Is Transforming Maritime Efficiency with Krassi Fotev

0:01 B Shake the Room Fire Nation, JLD here, and welcome to Entrepreneurs on Fire, brought to you by High Level, the all in one sales and marketing platform. Today we'll be breaking down decarbonizing global shipping, how a nature inspired hardware solution is transforming maritime efficiency. And to drop these value bombs, I have brought Crossy Fotev in the EOFIR studios. Crossy is a maritime technology entrepreneur, leading innovation in vessel efficiency and decarbonization. He is driving the adoption of passive hardware and soon data-driven solutions to reduce Emissions and transform global shipping operations. So today we talk about shipping inefficiencies, breakthrough technology from lab to ocean. And oh so much more. And a big thank you for sponsoring today's episode goes to Crossy and our sponsors.

0:44 Today's show is sponsored by Strawberry.me. If you're feeling stuck or like you're ready to get to the next level in your career, then finding the right coach can help. Go to Strawberry. Stop duct taping your business together. Highlevel runs your website, your funnels, email, automation, scheduling, payments, and memberships all in one place. And when you sign up at highlevelfire.com, you get a 30-day free trial plus my exclusive bonus stack that includes weekly office hours with me and much more. Visit highlevelfire.com. Hi. level fire dacom Classia, I want to start by talking about shipping inefficiencies. What

1:28 Are the key inefficiencies that are currently driving emissions and global shipping and why the heck have they persisted for so long? Shipping is uh being a big uh transport of goods. Um, even small reduction of the of the emissions over there will account for I don't know of the global emissions that that we have.

1:50 Uh so focusing on improving efficiency shipping is um is a good thing to do, but we should not lose focus of the of the other inefficiencies and the other modes of transport and uh electricity production and so on. Let's talk about breakthrough technology. How are you developing a simple passive zero opex fluid f uh flow technology to improve performance and fuel efficiency. It started from from observation in nature. Uh I was um I was windsurfing um on the island of uh Bonair at Lugbay.

2:27 Uh to be precise. And uh after wind direction change I noticed two dimensional repos on the bed everywhere around me. Uh so my education in physics kicked in and I began to think that um if those structures are indeed persistent and they turn out to be after research. Um then they must uh seize the flow somehow. Otherwise they'll smell out and they'll disappear. Uh so this was the basis of the of the invention and this is the basis of um of starting uh thirteen Mary.

3:01 So again, going back to your original question Uh why some people believe that uh this technology may not be successful it goes against the common wisdom that the smoother surface is a surface that produces less drag. Um as we as we found out. being able to modulate the flow, being able to

3:21 Um Assist the fluid self organized. Is um Indeed, assisting the drug and reducing the drug and helping the flow. So again, this is something that goes against the the common wisdom.

3:36 Uh that has been the for Um really long periods of time. And the work that we've done into towing tanks Experimental work, uh the work that we are doing at the moment on vessels with uh confirmed indication of savings. in actual operational conditions.

3:52 At the fraction of a cost of uh other technologies like um winter system propulsion or uh lubrication just to mention a few. Um, is uh he's great. I mean Uh the elements are totally passive. Uh there is no need to train anybody how to operate those because there's no need to operate them, once they install they always work. Um and uh this leads to considerable

4:19 Um I'd say considerable savings. Um That's um Comment

4:27 literally zero operating expense. In other words, the return of investment to the vessel owner is uh Um, probably one fourth and one fifth of uh what the return of investment to the vessel owner utilizing us uh active technologies, maybe. Let's talk about going from lab to ocean. So what exactly does it mean, Crossy, for you to launch your first commercial vessel solution and what partnerships made that possible? It's a big gap, right? It's a big gap going from the lab to the actual implementation. Why is it a big gap? Because the

5:01 Uh the testing facilities that were built uh throughout the twentieth and uh new facilities being built in twenty first century as well. And uh we were at one of those uh at uh Marugame on Imabari Island told by Imabari Shipbuilding. Um It's uh those testing facilities they are designed to work using something called fruit similarity.

5:26 And while the fruit similarity is able to capture Uh the overall performance of the vessel Uh well. And uh Could be a good indicator for

5:37 Full scale performance. Um this similarity breaks when it comes to manipulation of a boundary, that's something that we do. So in other words the conditions in the towing tank cannot be easily carried to uh full scale operational conditions for for the vessels for the technology that we have. Um so it The

5:56 Getting to a full scale implementation requires a leap of fate. And uh this sleep of fate um was demonstrated by companies like uh Swah Shipping and Armour Shipping. Um later by an investment from Mitsuyo S K lines. And an investment secured from Mimabari Ship Building. So without uh the two companies that place the first commercial orders.

6:20 And without the investment from um Mitsuyov Scarlett and Birdship Building we wouldn't be where we are at the moment. So, Fire Nation, we have a lot to talk about, decarbonization in practice, Middle East expansion, the future of shipping, and more. When we get back from thinking our sponsors. Today's show is sponsored by Strawberry Dot Me. I've interviewed nearly five thousand successful entrepreneurs and one thing they all have in common

6:46 They've enlisted mentors, coaches, and people along the way to help guide them. But where do you find the right coach or mentor? Great question. And that's where strawberry.me career coaching comes in. I speak from personal experience when I say that coaching and mentorship has helped me get to where I am today. In fact, you might not even be listening to entrepreneurs on fire if it weren't from my very first coach and mentor, Jamie Masters. I knew that in order to produce the best podcast, I needed to find someone who was where I wanted to be. Here we are nearly 14 years later, and I'd say I made a fantastic investment. So if you're feeling stuck or like you're ready to get to the next level, then finding the right coach can help. Go to strawberry.me slash fire and get 50% off your first coaching session. That's strawberry. E slash fire. Fire Nation, ideas are exciting, but systems will allow you to create freedom. That is where High Level comes in. High level allows you to build and run your entire business from one platform, website builder and hosting, funnel and landing pages, email marketing, automation and workflows, calendar booking, payments and subscriptions, even course and membership hosting.

7:55 Everything works together. Seamlessly, plus award winning 247 supports, so you are never stuck. And when you go through my link at highlevelfire.com, you unlock my full bonus stack. A 30 day free trial of high level with full access, a private 15 minute coaching call with me. Weekly live office hours with me, a digital copy of my book, The Common Path to Uncommon Success, my fifty days to something execution roadmap and more. Stop piecing tools together. Start building momentum. Visit highlevelfire.com and start building your something. Today. Crass you were back, and as I kind of teased before the break, I want to get into decarbonization in practice. I mean, for ship operators today.

8:40 What exactly does real world decarbonisation actually look like? We're not talking theory. But in operations. Well there are many things that uh that have been tried and many things the operators work on, uh, because uh saving fuels I mean serving fuel not only reduces the carbon footprint, but it leads to enormous commercial advantage. Um the obvious things um implementation of uh software technologies and uh

9:09 Optimizations of uh routing that is aligned with the currents. Um and those things are definitely leading to an improved performance of the vessels, but Um The Get into the core and get into the

9:25 uh the fundamentals and how the energy is being uh lost and dissipated. in shipping. is uh is something that we are really passionate about and this is why we are working on on Thirteen Mari and uh the passive drug prediction Uh for uh for vessels. Um in uh in terms of the other practical implementations, the majority of the implementations that are available today

9:49 Um again I'll mention the wind assistant proportion. This has been Probably around four thousand of years. With the introduction of flattened rotors about a hundred years ago. um uh old uh old technologies. Um then we have the lubrication. The air lubrication is a relatively new technology which was introduced by uh Mitsubishi, if I remember correctly, about twenty five, thirty years ago.

10:16 Um we also look at um easy to implement technologies like uh Bosco things. Which um Today adopted by the majority of the vessel. because of um relatively inexpensive product that has been proven to work.

10:34 But this is again technology that Was created by uh Mitsuy Oskay and I'm in collaboration with the Shame Laboratory maybe twenty five, thirty years ago. Uh so we see That the the most of I mean most of the technologies that are available uh relatively old technologies

10:53 Perhaps with the exception of uh the City campaigns which are relatively new uh development but I I have a follow the history of uh When the first city companies was applied. Uh, but I would uh I would be surprised if this was um less than fifteen, twenty years ago.

11:12 Um so there are things that uh can be done about improving the uh the vessel efficiency, improving the commercial advantage to to the vessel on us and then They're implementing them. Um we uh a newcomer. with uh a product that has not been

11:32 Um It's not available before, I mean it's a noble product. Um has not been tested. And um Simply because of the simplicity of the product we have uh a chance of

11:46 Come on implementation. So it's uh it's a really it's a really interesting space. Speaking of interesting space, the Middle East is an interesting place. So I want to talk about the Middle East expansion. So Why is the Middle East a key region for maritime innovation and specifically your crossy expansion strategy? So there are multiple maritime hubs that we could uh that we could go to and we can work with uh obviously there is Singapore, there is Hong Kong, then there is uh Middle East.

12:18 Um we can say that uh it's probably a maritime hub available in in South Africa as well, because the majority of the traffic goes through those places. Uh the Middle East for us is uh important, especially before the war on Iran as um relatively stable region, or at least this is uh how the Um You a

12:41 Um This is the image that UAE was building. Um and um Moving. And um expanding over there does make sense.

12:53 our technology can be implemented not only on uh container carriers in bulk of vessels, but on tankers too. And Uh fortunately and unfortunately the majority of the of the energy production still depends on oil. And big part of it. So

13:11 uh being able to offset a bit of the carbon emissions that we see uh from transportation of oil and uh after that from utilization of energy production. is something that we should Look to do. Let's talk about the future of shipping. I mean, how do you personally see the future of shipping evolving with a combination of smart hardware?

13:34 AI, autonomous maritime systems. I mean, these are all here and of course evolving rapidly as well. What's the future? The digital technologies uh here to stay. There's no Uh there's no question about it. Uh but again with the focus on digital technologies we forget uh to look at the fundamentals.

13:56 Um and the fundamentals uh uh the vessel operates in uh in a fluid, right? It loses the majority of the energy in the fluid. So optimization soon, the whole forms optimization soon Uh proposal. Um Optimizations um

14:14 And that's tied to assisting the proposal somehow with we assist that uh, for instance. Um Sales. uh is uh is something that the industry must adopt. In my personal opinion to really be able to get to And and then we have the alternative field.

14:32 Uh but there are a lot of problems with those. Um if we begin thinking about uh using methanol, thinking about using uh ammonia. Both of the of those uh substances uh poisonous. Um Uh so I don't expect that there will be a quick adoption of uh alternative fuels.

14:52 At the moment, mm still The The long cable chain feels uh uh something that the industry will be utilizing. But if we're looking at um getting to really

15:05 uh zero Emission. Um industry and really zero emission operations. And this is my physics education kicking in as well.

15:17 Um, I believe that there is a need to use nuclear. As uh strange as it may sound, uh, to people. Um It has been utilized in the Navies for extended period of time without Um

15:34 I'll see. See yes. Drawbacks to consequences, so at least we are not aware of uh of uh things that might have been happening on um on navy vessels. Um so that's uh That's uh something that uh the industry should really start looking into and I believe that it's looking into. So Crossy, if Fire Nation wants to connect with you, wants to learn more about your company, what should they do?

16:02 It's uh extremely easy. Uh you can always shoot an email at info at uh thirteen mari.com. Um you can always visit us online at uh thirsty Marie dot com. Um as well. Uh I would prefer Any mail?

16:18 Um Than anything than anything else. And um yeah we are we are looking for we are looking for new uh customers we're looking for companies that are willing to try the technology and uh looking to enhance the

16:37 Energy saving devices. I mean The set of energy saving devices that they implement on the vessels. Fire Nation, you're the average. Of the five people you spend the most time with, you've been hanging out with KF and JLD today. So keep up the heat and for links to everything we talked about, visit eofire dot com. Just type Crassy that's

16:55 K R A S S I in the search bar and the show notes page will pop right up and Crassy thank you for sharing your truth, your knowledge, your value with Fire Nation today. For that, we salute you and we'll catch you on the flip side. Thank you. Hey, Fire Nation, a huge thank you to our sponsors and Crassy for sponsoring today's episode. And Fire Nation, are you an entrepreneur on Fire who's looking to share your amazing message with the world? If yes, we are now accepting applications for EO Fire. So to learn more about becoming a guest, visit EOFIR.com slash guest, and I'll catch you there. Or on the flip.

17:28 Today's show is sponsored by Strawberry.me. If you're feeling stuck or like you're ready to get to the next level in your career, then finding the right coach can help. Go to strawberry.me slash fire and get fifty percent off your first coaching session. Stop duct taping your business together. Highlevel runs your website, your funnels, email, automation, scheduling, payments, and memberships all in one place. And when you sign up at highlevelfire.com, you get a 30-day free trial, plus my exclusive bonus stack that includes weekly office hours with me and much more. Visit highlevelfire.com. level fire dot com