with a now proven data product, we transi- tioned from an R&D effort into commer- cial growth. Wendy and Eric Schmidt (CEO of Google parent Alphabet), without whom Saildrone would not exist, now transitioned their support from a philanthropic nature to an investment position and we looked to take the project to the next level. By the end of 2015 Saildrones had cumulatively covered over 50,000 miles on deployments ranging from the North Atlantic to the South Pacific and the extremely crowded Gulf of Mexico. The drone fleet had navigated without incident and proved reliable. The challenge was how to transition to commercial opera- tions; who actually wanted the data and what was its real value?
For me this has been the biggest learning experience. While I am a lifelong sailor with a love of the ocean, until I learned the principles of ocean and atmospheric mea- surements I had no idea, as a planet, what trouble we were in.
gets absorbed by the oceans, they become increasingly acidic, dramatically affecting marine organisms and fish stocks. I am aware that some readers will be raising their eyebrows at this point but, regardless of where you stand on the climate debate itself, there is a pressing need to understand the rate of change.
Climate change believer or naysayer, once you actually start measuring ocean and climate variables you can’t ignore the facts; with higher levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, we are experiencing a period of rapid and apparently accelerat- ing warming. This warming will cause sea levels to rise and increase the frequency of extreme weather events. Simultaneously, as CO2
Climate predictions from numerical models vary due to, among other things, the sparse nature of accurate ocean input data and uncertainty over the processes at the atmosphere/ocean interface. It turns out that the Saildrone is uniquely suited to measure those variables and help under- stand the processes of heat and CO2 transfer through the ocean surface. We are not planning to sell drones, but instead sell data. Our goal as a company is to be the provider of the highest-resolution ocean data in the world. We believe the knowledge accrued will have profound impacts on our understanding, enabling better predictions of our weather, climate and fish stocks, to name just a few. In June 2016 three like-minded investors came together to back Saildrone’s vision in a $14m Series A fundraise. These resources have enabled us to run much faster, grow- ing the Saildrone team to 30 by the end of 2016 and expanding our production facility to be able to build as many Sail- drones as required, driven by global need and a rapidly evolving data market. I often think back to the many years of sitting in remote deserts, by myself, wait- ing for wind during the land speed record project, wondering where it all might lead. I am not sure I would have predicted this, but exciting times now lie ahead.
Design and build
Last week I collected two Generation-3 Saildrones from the Bering Sea, after another 105 days deployed on a fish stock analysis mission. This pushes the total distance travelled by the Gen-3 fleet alone to over 60,000nm. While the vessels have performed beautifully we were at the limit
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SEAHORSE 37
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