Dubai-bound MSC Virtuosa to feature real-time location tracking service for guests

Favendo’s Real Time Location Services will be installed aboard MSC Virtuosa, MSC Cruises‘ new cruise ship that will spend the 2021/22 cruise season sailing in the Arabian Gulf out of Dubai.

RTLS systems are used to keep track of exactly where people and assets are located and to provide personalized information about restaurants or pools or any “point of interest” on board. Favendo has been providing RTLS services to the cruise industry since 2015.

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Six cruise ships in the global fleet already feature the technology, but the system Favendo is supplying for MSC Virtuosa will be even more advanced. With the impending launch of a new Beacon Tracker, Favendo is proving that there is always room to improve.

“Our claim is to be able to guarantee our customers stable infrastructures and autonomous RTLS even under the most complex conditions, such as on the high seas,” says CEO Arnaud Becuwe.

The primary function of a real-time location system is to provide accurate and up-to-date location information. It works a bit like simulating an internal global positioning system for one ship only.

However, a system that can accurately determine any passenger’s location can be used to do a number of interesting things. For example, by tracking the real time positions of passengers and staff, RTL systems can be used for things like position-dependent messaging and a convenient wayfinding.

For example, the route to a specific pool on the multi-deck mega cruisers is then displayed on the user’s smartphone. Or consider a family that naturally becomes separated from one another during their journey.

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Especially older children like to be on the look-out for themselves. With Favendos RTLS, parents still keep an eye on their children and can view their whereabouts on their own smartphones at any time.

In this system the new Relay Mini is exactly the kind of leap forward that the industry has been waiting for. In the “simulated GPS system”, the Relay Mini Beacon Tracker takes on the role of a satellite. Favendo has succeeded in making their tracker even smaller and even more powerful.

The sensor can easily be embedded in existing fixtures, such as plug sockets and lighting fixtures. Less cables, lower costs with higher accuracy. As well as being more powerful and capable than previous generations, the new Relay Mini requires less than a single watt of power to run.

And aboard MSC Virtuosa, a mammoth cruise ship even bigger than MSC Bellissima (currently homeporting in Dubai), it will be especially useful for guests.

“To achieve [our goals], we need the best possible hardware, matched to our powerful software,” says Arnaud Becuwe, CEO of Favendo. “Because we don’t just track assets, we track children. Our many years of experience in these areas have been fully incorporated into the development of this beacon tracker.”