Press Releases

St. John's, Newfoundland – June 30, 2009 - Marport, a leading subsea acoustics technology company, announced today that that it has been awarded a contract valued at approximately C$1 million to supply its SQX-1 Autonomous Underwater Vehicle (AUV) to Geodetic Offshore Services Limited (www.goslng.com).

"This contract supports our stated strategic initiatives in subsea robotics and AUV technology for offshore energy, science and underwater defence markets," said Karl Kenny, CEO of Marport. "No work in the offshore industry can proceed efficiently without proper subsea survey information. From initial surveys, through to the commissioning of offshore installations and pipelines, survey data is the critical link between the various pieces of a complex infrastructure. We look forward to working closely with our customer to provide them with the underwater robotics technology to enhance their shallow and deep water surveys.”

Marport’s SQX-1 AUV is a hydro-dynamically stable platform designed for reliable performance and low life-cycle cost. Employing a unique propulsion and control system based on thrust vectoring, the SQX-1 is passively stable in pitch and roll, and features high manoeuvrability with capabilities such as hovering and a zero-turning radius. The vehicle will be equipped with Marport’s Software Defined Sonar platform – which will include advanced sensors, sounders and imaging sonar. The modular payload architecture can also be configured to include a wide variety of custom sensors to meet unique mission requirements.

Considerable investments by research institutes, manufacturers and the military are resulting in AUVs becoming increasingly accepted in some key roles where they have been shown to be more effective than previous technology. A recent analyst report identifies three significant growth markets for AUVS, namely oil & gas, research and military applications. The report covers the period from 2008-17 and identifies a “most likely” market scenario being valued at $1.8 billion with the upside market potential valued at over $3.5 billion.