The Ultimate Requirement as a Test Bed
The Jules Verne Trophy is the ultimate judge. To break this record, as Thomas Coville and his crew have just brilliantly achieved, one must maintain mind-bending average speeds over 21,000 nautical miles. But pure speed is no longer enough. The key is strategic intelligence: departing at the exact moment when weather systems align to offer the most efficient route to the Cape of Good Hope.
This is where D-ICE comes in. Working closely with Philippe Legros from the Sodebo routing cell, we deployed our DIBS (D-ICE Best Start) module. The goal? To analyse millions of possible departure scenarios to pinpoint the "golden window”, a pure optimization problem where every minute gained counts
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It’s not just math; it’s a high-stakes stress test. This pre-start phase forces us to push our advanced weather routing algorithms to their absolute limits. For our engineers, this is a full-scale validation that guarantees our systems are battle-hardened for any maritime operation, from LNG carriers to wind-assisted cargo ships.
Ocean Racing: An R&D Accelerator for the Maritime Industry
Why does a Deeptech company like D-ICE invest so much energy in competition? The answer is simple: ocean racing is our R&D laboratory. This environment offers us unique access to elite teams and high-fidelity real-world data. This partnership allows us to:
- Qualify our weather models and routing algorithms against the reality of the open ocean.
- Test the robustness of our systems (like Squid X) in hostile environments.
- Innovate in short cycles: the immediate needs of a skipper like Thomas Coville drive us to develop agile solutions that we might otherwise have only imagined five years down the line.
From Ultim to Cargo: Converting Speed into Fuel Savings
This is where the stakes go beyond sport. The technologies developed to optimize time on an Ultim are exactly the same as those required to optimize fuel on a merchant vessel
Fine-tuned weather routing, precise consideration of sea states, and predictive performance analysis are universal needs. All these technological building blocks validated by Sodebo's triumph are directly integrated into our commercial solutions to serve one purpose: efficiency.
In a highly competitive shipping market, our tools enable shipowners to:
- Secure operations through ultra-precise forecasting.
- Optimize fleet energy consumption via intelligent routing.
- Accelerate the transition to wind propulsion, leveraging our wind expertise acquired in racing.
Sodebo Ultim 3's victory is a source of immense sporting pride. But for D-ICE Engineering, it is also an industrial validation. Every mile gained by Thomas Coville helps us build, brick by brick, the artificial intelligence that will pilot the clean ships of the future.
Innovation only makes sense if it scales. From the cockpit of a world-record-breaking trimaran to the bridge of a cargo ship, we share the same horizon: safer, more efficient, and more sustainable navigation.
Crédit photo : Léonard Legrand/Team Sodebo
