Here at Coach Solutions, we are very proud of our most valuable and greatest asset – our employees. Without them – no Coach Solutions.

In our line of “Meet a Coach” interviews, we are today bringing an interview with Captain Ketan Bhatia, who is part of our Voyage Optimization Team. Ketan and the rest of the team has valuable experience in maritime navigation, which benefits our customers. The team is all about safety and optimization.

“Smooth Sailing and Safe Seas” to Ketan and the rest of the team.

Let us start with the basics, who are you?
My name is Ketan – I am 39 years young and from Mumbai, India. Married and father to a 9-year-old boy who doubles up as my sidekick.

What is your role here at Coach Solutions?
I have been with Coach for about 1½ years now. Being an integral part of the Voyage Optimization team, my role is to ensure the safe and smooth coordination and execution of voyages right from the start to the finish. Acting as the primary contact for clients and ship masters to deal with every voyage related query, issue, or concern.

Tell us your “story” before joining Coach? What have you been doing?
I am a Master Mariner and I have over 2 decades of experience in the maritime arena, having sailed on various types of ships with different companies. Specializing in the tanker trade having commanded Aframaxes and product tankers. Possess a BSc. degree in Nautical Science and a proficiency in Commercial Operations & Shipping Business.

Why did you join Coach?
Whilst planning to come ashore, Coach offered me a great and challenging opportunity to be a part of their dynamic organization. The idea of putting my sailing experience to use from a different perspective is what excited me to take up this role. Also, the prospects of learning and experiencing something new in the field of maritime digitalization is what attracted me to be a part of this passionate team.

Can you take us through a typical day for you here at Coach Solutions?
A typical workday for me includes assisting and advising the clients in finding the most optimal route, keeping in mind both the safety and commercial aspects. Most of the day is spent monitoring routes, managing queries from ship masters and giving out expert guidance, where needed. Am also in touch with clients addressing any specific concerns and update them with the progress of and any changes in the voyages.

Describe yourself as a person in a few words?
Ambitious, Conscientious, Innovative, Dependable, easy-going.

What motivates and drives you – both in your professional and private life?
Problem solving and overcoming challenges is what keeps me motivated. Coming up with new ideas to improve the system and enhance the user experience stimulates my thought process.

Knowing my efforts in advising and guiding ship masters and clients has made a difference, is really gratifying. The passion to give it my best and keep learning something new is what drives me.

Tell us what you are doing after “punching out” or during the weekends?
The love for travel and exploration takes me to different places. I enjoy trekking and plan a trip at least once a year to the mountainside. Love to spend quality time with my family, planning fun activities and getting creative with my son. At times I put on the “chef hat” to try and improve my culinary skills.

Let us start with the basics, who are you?
I’m 39 years old, a father of two and married to my wife, Karen, for the last 12 years.

What is your role here at Coach Solutions?
I do a bit of everything. I support our existing and potential clients in getting the most value out of our system; I work with our product design team to figure out what will be the next exciting thing we should develop; and finally, I act as product owner towards our development team to facilitate an efficient development process.

Tell us your “story” before joining Coach? What have you been doing?
I started my professional life by exploring the life as a seafarer, sailing a 6-month voyage with the Training Ship “Danmark” followed by an unfinished period of sailing as an officer’s cadet with Maersk Line.

After going ashore, I took a master’s degree in Naval Architecture from DTU (Technical University of Denmark) and after graduating I started working at FORCE Technology, in the team responsible for operating the only towing tank in Denmark. There, I worked for five years with CFD based hull form optimization and ended up as the team leader of the CFD team.

Why did you join Coach?
I found the idea of moving a bit out of the relatively theoretical calculations done with CFD and into actual operational data appealing. I could also see that COACH, which was a very young company when I started, had the potential to grow into something great and that I had a chance to help do that. We have not come all the way yet, but I am very proud of the company COACH has become and the small part I have played in getting us there.

Can you take us through a typical day for you here at Coach Solutions?
Voyage related queries comes directly under my official purview. My intention is to make sure the most optimized routing is relayed to the vessel. I address specific vessel I normally start by checking if any of our clients’ vessels need an updated performance assessment and then I will have a couple of meetings during the day for sales presentations or with colleagues for discussing internal matters. The last third of my day goes with answering phone calls and emails from the clients I support with using the system.

Describe yourself as a person in a few words?
I am a reasonably extrovert generalist engineer, which helps me understand relatively complex subjects and convey them to people coming from different backgrounds than my own.

What motivates and drives you – both in your professional and private life?
I love optimizing and automating inefficient manual processes to the point where you could almost accuse me of being lazy. Apart from that, I thrive on trying to make sense of seemingly senseless structures and try to create order and predictability.

Tell us what you are doing after “punching out” or during the weekends?
I split my free time between being with my family, playing video games and being in nature – sailing, fishing, hunting and hiking being my favorites.