Livewire Connections help to tell the dramatic story of the Volvo Ocean Race

Livewire Connections Ltd, of Chessington Surrey has been working with the organisers of the Volvo Ocean Race for a third consecutive time, with consultancy and providing airtime services for the 2011-12 Round the World Race.

Working with Volvo Ocean Race HQ and the six participating yachts, Livewire Connections in conjunction with the Race Partner Inmarsat, are continuing the successful working relationship for reliable satellite connectivity that they provided for both the 2005-06 and 2008-09 races.

There are four aspects to the services provided with this working partnership. Primarily the focus is on safety, the safety of the crew and the yachts. Secondly, there is the tracking function, which tracks the yachts up to every 10 seconds so the Volvo Ocean Race HQ can record where they are and verify who is lying in what position in the race. This is also a vital safety device for the race organisers as well as exciting for the sponsors and followers of the race being able to see the racing develop. Thirdly it enables the skippers and crew to send and receive communications to friends and loved ones, and finally the airtime services support the sponsorship campaigns, by enabling video footage, images and news updates to be streamed back from onboard the yachts as the action happens.

Livewire Connections have been responsible for the activation of all Inmarsat C and FleetBroadband terminals to establish off vessel communications. Inmarsat C email accounts are set up as a backup email communication method for the teams using the resilient Inmarsat C system. Although each boat has three crew members trained for medical emergencies, short dial codes are set up to enable each yacht to contact Volvo Ocean Race HQ and the shore side medical team in case of an emergency. There is also the emergency back-up service for the yacht crews where Inmarsat iSAT phones are ready in the liferaft grab bags, should they be required.

The Volvo Ocean Race is a high profile event and the sponsors want to have access to information about their yacht at any one time and be able to share that information with the wider audience through the Volvo Ocean Race Communication team.  The redundancy implemented in the setup including direct MPLS connections from the Land Earth Station to Volvo Ocean Race HQ as well a backup VPN route using the internet ensures fast and reliable transmission of the Live and Store & Forward Video footage back to the world’s media.

Monitoring and billing the sponsorship airtime is part of the service Livewire Connections provide. All firewalling and security is set up restricting Internet access to specific sites such as weather information, uploading videos, images and video conferencing.  At all times, including the Southern Ocean, the yachts will communicate to the other teams, race HQ and the worlds media via Inmarsat FleetBroadband systems.

Livewire Connections train and work with Volvo Ocean Race HQ and the yachts to ensure they are prepared for all eventualities to maintain connectivity with the yachts.