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The Emirates Maritime Arbitration Centre (EMAC) has continued bringing the maritime community together in its monthly breakfast seminars to discuss legal concerns within the maritime industry.

This week’s seminar took a look at Shipping and Technology – Blockchain and Beyond.

Addressing legal considerations in a changing digital environment cannot be ignored. It starts with understanding of what the digital changes are and how these affect the nature of how we conduct our business today.

Speakers, Dimitrios Vourakis, Managing Director of Curiositas and David Galea, Partner of Ince & Co. focused on maritime electronic platforms, automation, smart contracts, internet of things and artificial intelligence.

“Clearly the shipping industry is receptive to new innovation. While frontier technologies may see the majority of the industry being reticent about mass adoption, shipping companies need to have a watching brief as technology develops, improving efficiencies and cutting costs on a more scalable basis. While most need not be at the forefront of technology development, ignoring technological advancement will have a significant cost at a time where people cannot afford to lag behind their competitors,“ according to David Galea, Partner at Ince&Co.

“At EMAC we keep up with key discussions that are taking place within the maritime sector. Technology is advancing and even at EMAC, we are developing an e-arbitration system to support a paperless process”, said Mr. Majid Obaid bin Bashir, Vice Chairman and Secretary General at EMAC. “It is interesting to see how technology is embraced by the industry and to better understand what this means in the industry for the future.”

EMAC continues its breakfast seminars throughout the year, with the next session scheduled for November 11th as the first seminar to kick start the Dubai Arbitration Week 2018.