Voice-to-Report

Project goal

The “Voice-to-Report” research project aims to fundamentally transform service documentation in the maritime industry. An innovative, AI-based assistance system is designed to significantly reduce the workload of service engineers, who currently spend a considerable amount of their working time writing extensive service reports. The project aims to significantly increase efficiency and productivity through the use of wearable technology and AI models, while at the same time improving working conditions and the attractiveness of jobs in the German maritime supply industry.

 

Objectives

Currently, manual documentation after technical operations on ships is extremely time-consuming and requires highly specialized personnel. In addition, existing service reports often cannot be evaluated automatically due to individual writing styles and language skills. The planned system will overcome this discrepancy by using wearables to capture voice and image information during service activities, combining it, and automatically converting it into detailed service reports. This will not only reduce the documentation effort by 55 percent for selected report types, but also create a comprehensive knowledge base from historical assignments that can be used for future service assignments and sales activities.

 

Role of CML in Voice-to-Report

Fraunhofer CML acts as a scientific development partner in “Voice-to-Report” and contributes significantly to the technological implementation of the system. Our core expertise lies in the research and development of specialized machine learning models that form the foundation of the assistance system. We are responsible for developing domain-specific language models for the accurate transcription of maritime terminology, optimizing multimodal large language models (LLMs) for generating and adapting service reports from various data sources, and creating an intelligent linking module for transforming service reports into a searchable knowledge base.

 

Project consortium

The Voice-to-Report project is being implemented in close collaboration between three core partners: Wärtsilä Germany as the future user, ADTANCE as the potential system provider, and Fraunhofer CML as the scientific research partner. The consortium is complemented by several associated partners from shipping companies, shipyards, classification societies, and related industries, who provide valuable practical requirements and feedback. 

 

Funding

The project is funded by the BMFTR as part of the Maritime Research Program from July 1, 2025, to June 30, 2028.