Stephan Stout
Sales Manager East & South-East Europe DAMEN
Stephan Stout graduated from the Delft University of Technology as a naval architect . Within the Damen Shipyards Group he started as a design engineer for several market segments , preparing vessel designs to the customer requirements . Since a few years he has taken up the commercial responsibility for Greece and Cyprus , frequently visiting the region .
" Latest R & D developments in ship design "
The main focus of this presentation was on the R & D activities of Damen . One of the most important developments that Damen has done was the Axe Bow , which is an axe shaped bow . The cause for this was that many high speed craft had to reduce speed in adverse conditions , to reduce slamming of the bow which in effect caused high peak accelerations on both crew and the hull . As a response to this , Damen in cooperation with the Delft University of Technology have developed the axe bow , a patented bow shape that reduces peak accelerations due to slamming by 80 %. Many coast guard vessels can now be found in and outside of Europe that have this bow shape and it has proven to be a success . One of the main topics of today in the field of R & D is the energy transition . Damen has already built several hybrid and LNG-fueled vessels , and have even built fully electric ferries . Looking at the fuel roadmap , electrification cannot be applied for all markets and vessel types . An overview was presented of potential technologies that can be applied for the product portfolio .