Boating Industry Canada April 2015 - (Page Cover3)

Eventually you didn't have to do that because OEM radios improved. Later you couldn't do it because the radio was so integrated in the car, you might [with a nod and smile to Andrew Teich] upset the forward-looking infrared built into the cluster. The experience is a good cautionary tale of what to do as the distribution channel evolves and which products to support and which direction to take as a dealership. You don't want to embrace elements of technology that will undermine your business. As a manufacturer we eventually pulled out of these markets because there was no longer a place to sell those products and have them installed since they all went out of business. Teich: I think that's right on the money. I'd add that you need to focus on what you offer your customer that is difficult for them to get elsewhere. What you do is difficult-and the most difficult parts of a business are the most defensible and potentially the most profitable. The most difficult thing we all deal with in this industry is that we're working with a platform in the water that can be in random places around the world. To maintain that platform we need to be where the customer's problems are and be available 24/7 to solve their problems-that's the unique opportunity we have and we have to be the best at addressing that problem. This is the part of the business that can be leveraged. We're getting more and more technology on boats with increasing complexity, and people are probably spending less time preparing for their boating experience when in reality they need to be spending more time understanding the technology on their boats. Ottosson: I don't have much to add to that except that there are many lessons to be learned from things dealers provide, like service. You have the ability to pick out and provide what you're good at. Embrace one-stop shopping, upselling and preventive maintenance. Build lifelong relationships with customers. 4) What should (or could) be done to improve the cooperation between manufacturers to develop a standard to transport and share video data (i.e. radars, chartplotters), so that the consumer and the industry can work on a single platform? And what role should the NMEA take? Teich: Manufacturers have to embrace the concept of common standards and not be afraid of them. Protectionism of protocols for data transfer hasn't proved to be very successful for many industries over time. Take the CCTV industry for example, which FLIR is involved in. For a long time there were a few companies that had closed standards for viewing and control of their products. Today, there are open network video information exchange standards that most security cameras comply with. This allows more equipment on a networked system to work together. "you have the ability to pick out and provide what you're good at. embrace one-stop shopping, upselling and preventive maintenance. Build lifelong relationships with customers." What should NMEA do? Keep doing what you're doing- creating valuable standards like NMEA 0183 and NMEA 2000. These standards have significantly improved the connectivity of products within the industry and must be continued to include other new technologies that will be developed over time. Ottosson: We believe it's important to embrace open standards and open protocols for the transport of data. You have already seen this and NMEA has been instrumental in driving some of this. It's therefore going in the right direction although as always it takes too long. Common standards to transport and share data should not be an enemy for the manufacturers. However, going beyond that could mean less opportunity to gain return on investment and therefore slow down innovation. As manufacturers we need to innovate but we need to protect our investment-make it pay off-and that sometimes needs to be balanced. However, in the long run Navico believes open standards will be the way of the future. The standards that NMEA is writing are very helpful-they make boating less expensive and they make the job of everyone easier because we don't have to spend time on things that don't have to be that complicated. I believe the marine industry has gone in the right direction and maybe beyond other industries like cars and consumer electronics-Apple, Android, Microsoft. Kits van Heyningen: I don't think NMEA should be involved in video standards. NMEA did a great job with 0183 and 2000 because they were out front creating distributed sensor networks for free market access. On the video distribution side, the marine industry isn't a leader and that's not a criticism. Other much larger industries are developing larger formats-like HDMI and Apple AirPlay-that the marine industry can take advantage of rather than trying to create other standards, especially on the entertainment side. Video standards will be dictated by bigger players in the market; there may be opportunities inside the marine industry to develop components, like touch standards. www.boatingindustry.ca 31 http://www.boatingindustry.ca

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Boating Industry Canada April 2015

Insight
Industry News
Ad Nauseam
Impact - John Pfeifer
Propulsion - Mercury's Latest & Greatest
Product Innovation - Xantrex
Made in Canada - Nova Kool
The Boat Shop - NMEA

Boating Industry Canada April 2015