Leading Middle East port operator cuts vessel…

01 · The challenge

Problem

Vessel turnaround was 30% slower than peer ports. Berth conflicts caused USD 9M of demurrage annually. The control room ran on whiteboards and spreadsheets.

02 · How we delivered

Solution

AI traffic-ops platform with optimisation engine, real-time berth/crane orchestration, and predictive ETA. 7 quays, 240+ assets unified.

03 · Outcome

Impact

Vessel turnaround down 24%. Berth utilisation up 18%. Crane idle time cut 22%. USD 14M of annual yield uplift in year one.

How we delivered

Programme phases.

Five phases. One accountable team. Every phase had a named decision point and a measurable outcome.

Discovery & alignment

2–3 weeks

Workshops with the Leading Middle East Ports Operator executive team, baseline metrics, target outcome tree, programme governance set up.

Design & architecture

4–6 weeks

Reference architecture, security blueprint, joint squad model agreed. Data model and integration contracts published.

Build & live-parallel

Q2 onwards

Vertical slice built and run live-parallel against the existing system. Continuous integration, daily deploys, weekly business demos.

Cutover & scale

Mid-programme

Phased cutover, audit-aligned reconciliation, scaling out of squads, capability transfer to Leading Middle East Ports Operator teams.

Run & continuous improve

Steady state

Managed run with named SLOs, quarterly value reviews, and a 15% optimisation budget reserved for improvement work.

Engineering view

Architecture overview.

Foundations

Cloud landing zone, identity, network, security baseline. Data fabric with lineage-by-default. Audit-grade observability stack from day one.

Application & integration

Domain-aligned microservices behind a published API surface. Event-driven core with CDC into the data fabric. Live-parallel capability built in, not bolted on.

Trust & governance

RBAC, audit logs, lineage, policy-as-code. Model risk records for every production model. Compliance posture on the executive dashboard, not in a quarterly slide.

Built on

Technology stack.

Production-grade choices, defended by track record. The stack is one engineering decision among many — but a load-bearing one.

AWS Iceberg Optaplanner Kafka React Mendix

Trust by design

Governance & assurance.

01

Programme assurance

Independent assurance reviews at each phase gate. Findings tracked in a single risk register with named owners and remediation deadlines.

02

Security & data

ISO 27001, SOC 2 Type II controls applied throughout. Data lineage captured by default; sensitive data tokenised at the edge.

03

Audit-grade evidence

Every change tracked; every release reproducible. Audit packs assembled automatically for internal and external review.

04

Continuous compliance

Policy-as-code scans on every commit. Compliance posture surfaced on the executive dashboard, not in a quarterly report.

A control tower that actually runs the ports — not the meetings about the ports.

C Chief Operating Officer · Leading Middle East port operator

What we learnt

Three things we would do again.

01

13 months from kickoff to first regulated outcome — squad density and decision velocity matter more than headcount.
02

Joint squads with Leading Middle East Ports Operator engineers stayed in place after go-live. Ownership did not transfer in a hand-off — it grew in place.
03

Live-parallel for a meaningful window before cutover bought us trust. The cutover itself was a flag flip, not a war room.

Related case studies.

All case studies →

BFS

Book the partner

Want a programme like this one?

Tell us your sector and your timeline. A senior partner with sector experience will respond within one business day.

Request Executive Briefing

Leading Middle East port operator cuts vessel turnaround 24% with AI traffic ops