All Aboard With The Latest Technologies

The Queen Mary 2, scheduled to embark on its maiden voyage on Jan. 12 from Southampton, England, to Fort Lauderdale, Fla., is more than the biggest and most costly passenger ship ever built. It also boasts some of the most advanced technologies available to the cruise industry.

The cruise liner cost $780 million to build and will accommodate up to 2,620 passengers and 1,235 crew members. "We wanted to be able to exploit any technologies we could to enhance the guest experience beyond what any ship has done," says Jeff Richman, director of business solutions and applications development for Cunard Line, the Carnival Cruise Lines unit that manages the ship.

Most of those technologies are geared toward making life more convenient for guests, an important consideration in an increasingly competitive industry. An interactive TV system available in all guest cabins features E-mail access, onboard shopping, in-room beverage ordering, access to customized itineraries, and the ability to report problems such as backed-up toilets or burned-out light bulbs. The food-ordering system will let dining-room staff communicate with kitchen staff via real-time chat, translating into fewer trips to the galley and more staff presence on the dining floor. A network of wireless nodes will deliver Internet access for passengers who can't resist bringing their laptops along on vacation.

Cunard's technology staff at its Miami headquarters created a model that simulates the ship's three onboard computer rooms and cabins in order to refine the software and infrastructure components developed for it. The technology components were sent to France, where the finishing touches on the ship wrap up this week.

Cunard has gone further with the smart-card technology that has become pervasive on cruise liners. In addition to providing cabin entry and serving as an onboard credit card, passengers' cards will contain their passport information and photos, meaning guests no longer need to carry their passports when they leave the ship while in most ports of call. This also lets the crew more efficiently provide port officials with accurate passenger information. The cards were developed using Discover Travel System's Ship Partner software, which integrates the ship billing system with all point-of-sale systems and automatically reconciles bills with the ship's vendors.

For the internal business of running the ship, a computer-based tool called the Avoid Verbal Orders system gives ship officers current information on maintenance projects and cabin issues. And a crew-personnel system tracks which crew members are onboard while at ports of call and provides details on the staff members' training, certifications, and skills. Increasingly, cruise lines will invest in those types of communication technologies, says David Leibowitz, a cruise-industry analyst with Burnham Securities. "A ship is a city," he says. "As a consequence, when you have that many individuals, communications is essential."