e3 Systems at the 2025 Palma Boat Show

At the Palma International Boat Show e3 Systems will have our regular spot on the quay within the Palma Superyacht Village. PIBS has become one of Europe’s most important superyacht shows and enjoys its status as the starting gun for the Med season, the Easter weekend just a few days before.

e3 Systems has teamed up with our friends at Astilleros de Mallorca and Miller Marine to host a charity ride for Captains and crew in aid of Superyacht Charities – a lovely initiative that makes an additional contribution to the magnificent work they do. It’ll be a nice way to arrive at the show via the mountains of west Mallorca.

When people ask what I do for a living when not on my bike – and I reply that we provide connectivity solutions for Superyachts – the inevitable questions move typically towards Starlink, its impact as great now as it was when it arrived on the market a few years ago, when e3 Systems became an authorised reseller and added it to our list of managed and supported services that we provide to the superyacht sector.

Whilst Starlink is, of course, the primary connectivity source for most yachts’ connectivity requirements both inshore and offshore, significant changes to its airtime structure have greatly affected many vessels plans for the forthcoming 2025 summer season, particularly when it comes to inshore coverage.

In addition to a new $150 network access fee, chargeable each month for Global Priority connectivity, the biggest impact has been the removal of free of charge and unlimited inshore ‘Mobile Data’, once Global Priority (connectivity everywhere that Starlink itself is authorised – and both inshore and offshore) has been consumed.

This change has very much brought 4G5G options back into the fold for 2025, with 4G5G in some cases – particularly regionally – being considerably less expensive. So, it’s become a balancing act between the two main sources of connectivity, although everyone should remember that in spite of these changes, bandwidth at sea has never been as reliable, fast or cheap as it is now.

In addition, Starlink have recently added the Starlink Mini to their range of antennas that can access Global Priority services, for which e3 Systems are also an authorised reseller, albeit with several important restrictions that need to be understood. Please come by our stand at the show or get in touch to discuss what these are, but it’s safe to say that whilst Starlink launched with a relatively simple range of packages and hardware to access the network, these get more complicated by the day. It was always likely to happen… Look at any online forum and you will see a host of complaints – again from those that have never had it so good, but got used to it pretty quickly!

The other key difference between the Starlink HP (High Performance) antenna and the Starlink Mini is in the performance of the antenna itself, capable of significantly slower download speeds than its HP big brother, but an ideal solution for <30m local vessels staying in the same region, particularly areas where 4G5G network coverage is notoriously bad – think Ibiza, Formentera and the north coast of Mallorca, which it solves at a stroke, with download speeds being comparable with a good 4G5G set up.

Finally, there is the question of what vessels do that rely solely on Starlink – and who may have Turkey on their cruising agenda during 2025 – a region where Starlink is not authorised and will essentially switch itself off as soon as you arrive into Turkish waters.

Our e3 Big Data Europe card is valid in Turkey and can either be used on a Pay As You Go basis at 1,95 € per GB if you are planning to be there briefly, or as a No Limits option at 795 € per GB for 1.2 TB if planning to stay longer– considerably cheaper than Starlink – with the option of additional data at just 0,95 € per GB. It is also a monthly contract with free of charge suspension and reactivation when required – so brings with it maximum flexibility.

This highlights further that a good contemporary 4G5G set up remains crucially important itself, as is the IT network on board – which is often the bottleneck that limits the user experience in these days of the super-fast bandwidth speeds that are now commonly available. Upgrading IT networks has been a busy task for us during this last refit season precisely for this reason – an often-inexpensive process with a great return.

Finally, many vessels are not completely comfortable having all their eggs in Elon’s basket and the additional costs for 2025 may not be the end of it. However, viable options also exist in the LEO connectivity sphere with the commercial launch of the OneWeb network on either Kymeta or Intellian antenna hardware – seen as a useful alternative or back-up to Starlink as a primary source but also offering a much more comparable service to Starlink than conventional VSAT ever has in the areas where Starlink remains inaccessible.

We will have all these options on display at PIBS and would be delighted to see you there. You will find us on the diagonal row of exhibitors towards the swing bridge beyond Moll Vell; Stand Number SY23.

Enjoy the show and wishing you all a wonderful 2025 summer season!

Hamish.Goddard@e3s.com / www.e3s.com 

+34 971 404 208 / +34 686 634 038