“Weeks and months at sea without being connected to family and friends can lead to feelings of isolation and depression for the thousands of commercial maritime sailors who are responsible for the transportation of goods around the globe,” said Dan Rooney, commercial maritime product director, Speedcast. “CrewReach provides cost-effective prepaid mobile data access to terrestrial mobile networks, enabling crew to reach out via social apps and reducing isolation from their families and friends. CrewReach also gives subscribers a limited amount of free access to the popular chat apps WhatsApp® and WeChat®, making social connectivity even more cost-effective.”

CrewReach is available for all unlocked smartphones and is managed via a mobile app (available for iOS and Android devices). The mobile app puts subscribers in complete control of their spending, showing data costs in each country and the amount of data consumed. Sailors can purchase additional credit either via a credit card or prepaid voucher.