| Abstract : | Chartering is presumably the most prominent maritime sector that involves a constant flow of information and the maintenance of fruitful relationships. This field can be seen as an information network, whose transactions are facilitated not only by the intermediaries who conclude the deals between the shipowners and charterers, but by technological aids as well. The advent of technology has greatly benefited these intermediaries - or otherwise called ship brokers - since they have been provided with several communication modes that overtime positioned them as valuable sources of market information and knowledge. Apart from this, ship brokers have been long been considered as highly appreciated figures within the shipping sector, since they are the individuals who shipowners and charterers would trust and advise when looking for conducting business. Nevertheless, just like any other market intermediary, ship brokers incur additional costs and time-consuming processes. Consequently, technological innovation has also been aiming in creating software and electronic platforms, which can imitate the role of a ship broker or even automatically perform several tasks which fall under a broker’s job description. Therefore, this study will aim to investigate whether and to what extent such technological advances are adequate and sophisticated enough in order to replace ship brokers. To do so, a survey was handed out to both shipowners and charterers in an attempt to evaluate their expectations and opinions on the topic. Since chartering is a relationship-driven, the main theme which prevailed in the survey regarded technology’s possible effects on the relationship between brokers and shipowners and its impacts on the broker’s profession. What was found was that the relation between brokers and shipping companies is based on elements such as trust, commitment, and loyalty which are also they key principles to success. Meanwhile, we discovered that modern technology, even though it has made broker’s life easier and less time consuming is inefficient to handle the large scales of incoming information. Albeit the above, brokers and shipowners are not ready yet to adopt new technological techniques even though brokering house’s personnel is computer literate enough to proceed to high-tech innovations. Our recommendations could be summarized to the point that the shipping industry, especially in the boundaries of Greece, needs a better understanding of technology applications and more educative steps in order to create a more effective and digitized environment. Moreover, the broker’s profession may be endangered ifbrokers could not integrate technology into their day-to-day operations. Steps have already been taken, internationally, towards a more digitized future, and we could highly recommend that brokers should risk and invest in high-tech applications and techniques in order to keep their strong position into the maritime field.
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