AI Vessel Management System for Marinas
Identify every vessel that enters or leaves your marina. Read its name and registration, flag unregistered craft, measure its speed and alert your team in under two seconds. Built by HCT and running live in Dubai.
Why marinas need more than CCTV
Most marinas still log vessels by hand or review footage after something goes wrong. Plate recognition built for cars fails on water: boats move unevenly, registration marks sit in different places on every hull, and glare, spray and darkness defeat ordinary cameras.
Unknown craft slip in
Unregistered boats and jet skis enter without a record, and nobody knows until a berth is taken or an incident happens.
Speeding damages berths
Wake from vessels above the channel limit damages moored yachts and pontoons, with no evidence of who did it.
Staff are not ready
Berthing teams learn a yacht has arrived when it is already at the pontoon, not when it enters the channel.
What the system does
One platform for vessel identification, access, speed enforcement and berthing operations, designed for the marine environment.
Reads every vessel
Registration plate, vessel name, type, model and estimated length, captured with front, side and rear images.
Self-improving recognition
Each crossing is checked against the fleet baseline and misreads are corrected automatically from learned patterns.
Flags unknown craft
New, foreign and unregistered vessels and jet skis are flagged the moment they cross the gate.
Speed enforcement
Speed measured from hull transit across a calibrated gate line. Violations above your limit are logged with evidence.
Every crossing, one record
All cameras are merged into a single record per crossing, with direction in or out taken from the image.
Instant berthing alerts
Push alerts about 1.6 seconds after the crossing, so the team is waiting at the berth, not chasing the boat.
How it works
Intelligence runs at the waterfront, so the system keeps working on ordinary mobile backhaul and keeps sensitive footage close to the site.
Capture
High-resolution gate camera with automatic day and night profiles and white-LED illumination, supported by pole cameras at every crossing.
Edge AI
An AI edge computer at the marina runs vessel detection, motion tracking, text recognition and speed measurement in real time.
Platform
Web dashboard and mobile app with live view, event log, vessel profiles, speed violations, berthing and push alerts.
Operate
Health watchdog, automatic rollback, nightly backups and named user access keep the system running around the clock.
Built for the marine environment
Water is harder than roads. The platform is trained and calibrated on real marina traffic, not adapted from a car-park product.
- Handles varying vessel speeds, wakes and turning boats in a narrow channel
- Reads registration marks in different positions and sizes on each hull
- Works through glare, spray, haze and night conditions
- Processes on site, so limited waterfront bandwidth is not a bottleneck
- High accuracy with minimal hardware: one gate camera and a compact edge computer can cover an entrance
Running live at a premium marina in Dubai
HCT designed, built and deployed the full system end to end: cameras, edge AI, recognition models, speed enforcement, web dashboard and mobile app. It has run live at the marina entrance since October 2026.
97%+
Recognition accuracy in day and night operation
1.6 s
Crossing to staff alert
Every crossing
Logged with direction, images and speed
Web and mobile
Dashboard and app for the marina operations team
Deployment options
The same platform and site hardware in every option. You choose how the software is hosted and licensed.
Cloud
Annual platform licence with hosting in the UAE. Lowest upfront cost and the fastest start.
Perpetual licence
One-time licence with cloud hosting, for operators who prefer capital spend over subscriptions.
On-premises
Perpetual licence on a server owned by the marina. Footage and records never leave the site.
Operating several marinas? One central dashboard can cover every site, with permissions per marina.
Who it is for
Marina operators
Access control, berthing coordination and speed enforcement across one or many marinas.
Ports and maritime authorities
Vessel identification and movement records at channels, harbours and controlled waterways.
Waterfront developments
Island resorts, yacht clubs and waterfront communities that need security without extra headcount.
Frequently asked questions
What is an AI vessel management system for marinas?
It is a camera and edge AI platform that detects every vessel entering or leaving a marina, reads its registration and name, measures its speed and logs each crossing with images. Marina staff get instant alerts on a web dashboard and mobile app, replacing manual logbooks and generic CCTV review.
How accurate is boat and vessel recognition, including at night?
In live operation at a Dubai marina the HCT system has measured above 97% recognition accuracy in both day and night conditions. The gate camera switches automatically between day and night profiles and uses white-LED illumination so registration marks stay readable after dark.
Can the system detect jet skis and unregistered or foreign vessels?
Yes. Detection is based on vessel class and shape, not only on a list of known boats. Every crossing is compared against the marina fleet baseline, so new, foreign or unregistered craft, including jet skis, are flagged the moment they cross the gate.
How is vessel speed measured?
Speed is calculated from the time the hull takes to cross a calibrated gate line, set against the vessel length. Any vessel above the marina limit, for example 3 or 5 knots, is logged as a speed violation with time, direction and evidence images.
How fast are alerts delivered to marina staff?
Push alerts reach the berthing team about 1.6 seconds after a vessel crosses the gate, so staff are ready before the vessel reaches its berth.
Does the system need a strong network connection at the marina?
No. Detection, tracking, text recognition and speed measurement all run on an AI edge computer at the marina. Only events, images and short clips are sent to the platform, so the system works on standard 4G or 5G backhaul.
Can our data stay on our own premises?
Yes. The platform can run in the cloud, hosted in the UAE, or fully on-premises on a server owned by the marina operator, so footage and vessel records never leave the site.
How long does deployment take?
A single marina entrance is typically live 4 to 6 weeks from order, covering site survey, camera and edge installation, calibration, training on local vessel traffic and user onboarding.
Can it integrate with our existing CCTV and marina software?
Existing IP cameras are assessed for reuse during the site survey, and vessel events can be shared with marina management, access control and VMS platforms through APIs scoped to each project.
See it running on live marina traffic
Book a live demo of the platform or a site survey of your marina entrance. We will show you real crossings, real alerts and a deployment plan for your site.