XOCEAN

XOCEAN is a provider of uncrewed ocean data delivery services, founded in 2017, with offices in Ireland, the UK, the US, Canada, Norway and Australia. Rather than selling vessels it sells the data: using uncrewed surface vessels it provides turnkey ocean data, describing its approach as a safe, economic and carbon neutral solution to ocean data delivery, and positioning itself on high safety, low impact, scalability, rapid delivery and weather tolerance. The markets it names are offshore wind, geophysical, environmental, asset integrity, bathymetry and fisheries, and it counts many of the world's largest energy companies and government agencies among its customers. Its principal data sets are multibeam echosounder, sub-bottom profiler, side-scan sonar, magnetometer and ultra-short baseline, with other data sets available on request. The specific sensor systems it operates are named on its site: Norbit Winghead, R2Sonic 2024/2026 and Valeport SWiFT SVP for multibeam; Innomar Standard/Medium and Innomar Deep for sub-bottom profiling; Klein 4K-SVY, EdgeTech 4125 and Sonardyne HPT 3000 for side-scan; and Marine Magnetics Synapse with a TVG configuration option for magnetometry. There are two ways to work with the company. Under the direct model XOCEAN works closely with the client to understand the data need, provides a turnkey offering on a fixed price fully inclusive basis, completes acquisition using one or many USVs, then carries out processing and interpretation and delivers the final report. Alternatively clients can draw on the XOCEAN data library, an extensive and continually growing collection of existing high-quality ocean data available for immediate delivery, which the company suggests checking before commissioning a new collection campaign. The technology underneath is a fleet of survey class USVs that XOCEAN describes as the world's largest, designed and manufactured at its Technical Centre in Ireland and supported by international operational hubs it is developing to serve fleets in-market. The vessels remain offshore for extended periods harvesting large volumes of data while operators and data analysts stay safely onshore, connected over a satellite link. Stated design features include full over horizon operations, MCA Cat 0 certification, 24/7 operations, a hybrid power system, satellite communications and industrial grade sensors. Control runs through the CyberDeck, a secure cloud-based environment used to monitor and control each USV and to let the data analyst team check the quality of incoming data and adjust vessel and sensor parameters in real time. Published project examples show the range: multibeam bathymetry and backscatter plus sub-bottom profiler data giving 10m sediment penetration, combined with aerial drone photogrammetric terrain mapping for a seamless landfall data set, for a carbon capture and storage scheme; side-scan and magnetometer UXO clearance across 233 sites with ALARP certificates issued for all survey locations; and export cable route geophysical survey work for offshore wind farms.