ThayerMahan and Ocius sign agreement to produce long-duration USV with acoustic sensor arrays to strengthen AUKUS Pillar II objectives

"The ocean covers more than 70% of our planet, and there is a pressing need to expand our awareness of what lies beneath its surface," said Mike Connor, Chairman and CEO of ThayerMahan, Inc. "Our collaboration with Ocius helps us to maximize the performance of our scalable surveillance systems. Together, we will help AUKUS nations know what is in the undersea domain - preserving their advantage in a changing and uncertain world."

Under the agreement, ThayerMahan will install its Outpost passive acoustic maritime surveillance system aboard Ocius's Bluebottle unmanned surface vessel (USV). This collaboration will generate uncrewed acoustic sensing systems that can be deployed to create distributed undersea surveillance networks in support of Pillar 2 of the AUKUS agreement. These systems will enable delivery of cost-effective, wide-area sensor capacity wherever needed.

"Both companies share a mutual love of technology and the sea and have complementary proven products," said Robert Dane, Chief Executive Officer of Ocius Technology Ltd. "Recently, in San Diego, engineers from both companies worked as a team to combine ThayerMahan's TRL8 (-9) Outpost system with our TRL8 (-9) Bluebottle USVs and then successfully achieved a results-driven demonstration."

The four-day demonstration was conducted at the April 2024 Association for Uncrewed Vessel Systems International XPONENTIAL global conference and exhibition on autonomy, uncrewed systems, and robotics in San Diego, California. It showed that the Outpost-Bluebottle combination presents credible, highly effective, operational, undersea surveillance from an uncrewed platform that is capable of long-duration deployments. The Bluebottle USV was deployed 10 miles offshore with a deep-towed passive acoustic array and an onboard digital signal processor. Live data, streamed to the conference exhibition floor, was used to detect and classify undersea, surface and airborne contacts in the approaches to San Diego in near-real time.

This collaboration leverages ThayerMahan's expertise in deploying and operating sophisticated low-power acoustic sensors and advanced, AI-enabled acoustic processing with Ocius' expertise in providing rugged, long-dwell autonomous vehicles that harvest wind, solar, and wave energy to drive a hull derived from Australia's world-class sailboat racing designs. ThayerMahan has already taken delivery of its first two Bluebottle vehicles at its headquarters in Groton, CT.

The Bluebottle USV provides a reliable and maneuverable platform with the payload capacity to support Outpost and other maritime sensors. This new Outpost variant provides significant undersea defense capabilities in an efficient, safe, and cost-effective manner that will be a true force-multiplier for the US and Royal Australian Navies' capital ASW assets, and meet the pressing need to expand our awareness of what lies beneath the surface of the ocean.

In addition to undersea surveillance, this partnership positions Outpost for other maritime security, law enforcement, and environmental monitoring missions.

About ThayerMahan

ThayerMahan, Inc. is a maritime technology company dedicated to providing its government and commercial clients with turn-key autonomous marine solutions, including deployment, operations, data gathering, and analysis services, using state-of-the-art acoustic and electronic sensors integrated on a variety of host platforms tailored to specific mission criteria. The company is headquartered in Groton, CT with additional locations in Lexington and New Bedford, MA, Norfolk, Virginia Beach, and Arlington, VA. For more information, please visit ThayerMahan.com or contact directly at [email protected]

About Ocius  

Ocius Technology Ltd. Delivers innovative autonomous solutions for persistent maritime surveillance. Their new generation of USVs power large payloads, roam widely, and stay at sea for months at a time. Ocius USVs offer economic and operational advantages over conventional methods in a multitude of industries. Utilising solar, wind and wave power, these vessels can autonomously monitor designated areas for lengths of time. For more information, please visit Ocius.com.au or contact directly at [email protected]

SOURCE ThayerMahan, Inc.