The company, formed in 2018, has developed a unique means of ocean data collection that takes a refreshingly holistic approach to deep-sea exploration, and leverages the latest advancements in hardware, software, and ocean technology to provide the world’s first deep ocean data-as-a-service business.
Instrumental to this democratization of ocean data is the company’s groundbreaking “AxV” vehicle, or, more accurately, pair of vehicles. The AxV, named so on account of its dual autonomous surface and subsurface capabilities, is a vehicle system that consists of two (or more) identical unmanned assets (see Figure 1), one operating semi-submerged and the other at depth.
While deployed, the topside AxV provides surface data collection, communications and navigational assistance, while the other AxV conducts its subsea mission. The two AxVs can then substitute roles once the submerged vehicle resurfaces to recharge its hybrid system of lithium batteries using an air-generated power bank.
“We believe that a deeper understanding of the oceans is achievable through autonomous marine robotics,” according to Terradepth cofounder Judson Kauffman. “Terradepth’s technology proposes to drastically lower the cost of decision-critical, deep-sea data for a wide range of ocean stakeholders.”
Terradepth’s AxV utilizes a cooperative acoustic networked navigation architecture to provide varying grades of absolute positioning accuracies needed for ocean data collection. With multiple sets of vehicles working in unison, units at the surface provide positioning commands and act as a control gateway to those underwater. Our mission autonomy computer processes each data collection run and automatically re-tasks itself for additional surveys, as necessary, through the onboard analytics software.
Terradepth’s approach is further testament to the advent of unmanned vehicles for marine exploration. The AxV system, which is deep ocean rated, highly modular, and can support a large payload of sensors, is deployable from shore, air, or surface vessel, and missions are controlled from a state-of-the-art operations center in Austin, Texas.
Terradepth is effectively rewriting how oceanic data is harvested, transmitted and processed using state-of-the-art machine learning and sophisticated software. According to Kauffman, assigning manned tasks to highly intelligent machines trained to process ocean data has dramatically reduced the time and margin of error associated with long-established methods.
For the end-user, however, Terradepth maintains that data should be easy-to-understand and that’s why the company prioritizes high resolution visualization techniques for geophysical survey and offshore infrastructure monitoring services. This, after all, is critical to the democratization of data.
This story was originally featured in ON&T Magazine’s June 2020 issue. Click here to read more.
