Riptide Autonomous Solutions: Engineering Next-Gen Micro UUVs

Rising instances of oceanic warfare are opening up a new market to create underwater vehicles that promote a deeper understanding of the undersea world. Unmanned underwater vehicles (UUV) can search out mines much quicker and with greater efficiency than a team of human divers, as well as perform a range of other functions, such as persistent surveillance and anti-submarine warfare among several others. While larger vehicles capable of withstanding underwater pressure are increasing in demand, a gap was noticed in the smaller low-cost vehicle space. Riptide Autonomous Solutions, a start-up, bridges this gap by introducing state-of-the-art electronics and processing capabilities in smaller vehicles. Riptide currently offers a smaller and more affordable vehicle which not only endures high oceanic pressures but also provides greater endurance than any other vehicle previously envisioned.

Earlier, the U.S. Navy, which is their chief client, had to rely heavily on large, expensive vehicles to meet its defense needs as smaller vehicles hardly had the required degree of longevity. The effectiveness of the underwater vehicle depends upon its efficacy in carrying out required tasks, which in turn depends on the vehicle’s sensors. The latest single-board computers and low power processing combined with Riptide’s commercial processors and unique methods of engineering and packaging make the vehicles both highly capable and highly flexible. This provides users with a reliable and robust platform to advance technology development.

Riptide is distinguished by the fact that its sensors form the major part of the vehicle’s cost and power consumption, whereas the vehicles of other companies tend to dominate the system’s cost and power budget. Jeff Smith, CEO of Riptide Autonomous Solutions, explains, “We create a vehicle around the sensor and application, which enables us to wrap a custom solution around the sensor to optimize it for to the desired mission endurance, driving higher data collection rates.” Riptide’s major challenge was to make the undersea vehicles, which historically cost a few million dollars, available in the range of ten thousand dollars without compromising on their capabilities.