A new AI-enabled “expertise transfer” platform is aiming to help maritime companies retain critical know-how as shipyards and vessel operators brace for a wave of retirements among their most experienced personnel.
The ageing workforce issue is familiar across segments of shipping and its related industries, and for its first deployment, Dolgo is looking to help save US shipyards.
Nithesh Wazenn, founder of Dolgo, said his business has been shaped by the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)-funded accelerator program and has the longer-term ambition of supporting skills mobility across the wider maritime value chain.
The platform is designed to capture and structure expertise from formal documentation such as Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) and from day-to-day troubleshooting conversations. That expertise is then made accessible “just in time” to frontline workers, while keeping human specialists in the loop. If the system cannot answer safely or confidently, it will direct the user to a subject-matter expert rather than speculate, Wazenn said.
A central part of Dolgo’s proposition is an incentive model that financially rewards employees whose knowledge is used by others, supporting retention in an increasingly competitive labour market. Many digital tools capture interactions and expertise for the benefit of the company without giving individuals ownership or compensation for the expertise they share; Dolgo is designed to “give the ownership of that expertise to the person who created it,” said Wazenn.
The service will help to plug leaks in what Wazenn described as a rapidly narrowing pipeline of maritime professionals. With an ageing workforce, rebuilding capacity through traditional training routes would take years, he said, and the sector needs mechanisms to boost the competence of newer workers faster.
Unlike conventional knowledge bases, the platform is intended to capture expertise implicitly during work. Support calls made through the platform can be recorded and transcribed, then problem-solving steps that were not already contained in existing procedures can be identified. The system can then prompt experts to validate and incorporate new solutions into multiple relevant documents across the organisation’s knowledge base, he said.
The company is currently testing use cases with the University of South Florida and its Port and Maritime Center, and the Florida Institute of Oceanography, including operational tasks such as installing and monitoring buoys and onboarding ships. Wazenn said the company has completed two proofs of concept and that the minimum viable product is already operational.
Commercially, the start-up is targeting small- to mid-sized shipyards and other maritime businesses—including ship managers—that feel exposed when key individuals leave, taking decades of operational know-how with them.
Safety and compliance could prove an accessible entry point as it can be adopted without disrupting core production workflows, said Wazenn, before expanding into more complex operational decision-making as clients build trust in the system.
Dolgo is set to exhibit at CMA Shipping 2026, and Wazenn will speak at the event’s Safety Forum |Dry Bulk Vessel Vetting session on Wednesday, 11 March, 2026.
