Autonaut USV – Growing, Moving, Recruiting

To accommodate more orders for the unique wave-propelled AutoNaut uncrewed surface vessel (USV) the company is moving from its base in West Sussex to Okehampton in Devon in June 2024.  There AutoNaut will share larger premises and resources with the Seiche Water Technology Group of companies (SWTG).  Recruitment is ongoing for workshop, sales, software and systems engineers.

“This is a great opportunity to bring the companies together and share skills and resources, as well as enabling expansion to meet demand,” said Mark Burnett, Director – Seiche Group.

AutoNaut’s job opportunities can be found at:  AutoNaut Careers

The AutoNaut USV is well known for its ability to carry a wide range of sensors into the most extreme ocean environments, and to remain at sea for months, covering thousands of miles without the requirement for a mother ship.

“Such hostile environments require a level of skill and build perfectionism that is similar to the space industry,” Mark said.  “We are proud of what AutoNaut has achieved since it started in 2013 and Seiche invested in 2016.  Now, as the global USV market expands, we are looking to recruit the high-level skills that will enable us to ramp up production.”

Illustrating AutoNaut’s recent achievements:

• A fleet of four of the 5m USVs is being deployed by the Barbados Meteorological Service for hurricane forecasting, with two more in build.
• Another of the zero carbon 5m USVs, fitted with a Sonardyne USBL transceiver, completed a ‘first’ with the Scottish Association for Marine Science by going out to the Rockall Trough, collecting a years’ data from a sensor moored 1,800m deep, transmitting those data ashore via satellite, and then going back to remotely recalibrate the bottom sensor.
• An earlier mission saw an AutoNaut with ADCP, wave sensor, PAM, CTD and metocean sensors complete a 115-day mission on the UK continental shelf break, covering more than 4,000 nautical miles.