Canada’s Ocean Supercluster & OSC Stakeholders Announce Exciting Milestone

Canada’s Ocean Supercluster (OSC) is pleased to announce the conditional approval of the Supercluster’s first Technology Leadership Project.

The Honourable Navdeep Bains, Minister of Innovation, Science and Economic Development, alongside the Honourable Seamus O’Regan, Minister of Indigenous Services were present to deliver the exciting news to a full house of industry, academic, and government stakeholders and ocean community members.

The OceanVision™ project is led by Kraken Robotics, a St. John’s-based marine technology company that specializes in the design, development and marketing of advanced sensors, software and underwater robotics for Unmanned Maritime Vehicles. The Technology Leadership arm of the Supercluster Program co-invests in collaborative projects with strong expected commercial outcomes that meet the functional and cost requirements of multiple ocean industry end users, strengthening the Canadian supply chain and encouraging data exchange. Kraken Robotics has partnered with other OSC Members, including: Petroleum Research Newfoundland and Labrador, Ocean Choice International, the Nunavut Fisheries Association, and Clearwater Seafoods, and a number of small to medium sized companies (SMEs), to develop an underwater technology service hub that will provide high-resolution images of the seafloor to a variety of ocean industries.

“We are excited to be announcing Canada’s Ocean Supercluster’s first technology leadership project as a significant step forward in the journey toward accelerating ocean innovation in Canada”, says Kendra MacDonald, CEO of Canada’s Ocean Supercluster. “This project brings together a rich set of partners across multiple ocean industries, including: fisheries, oil and gas and ocean technology, that will work in collaboration with each other to address shared ocean challenges. This project demonstrates the level of collaboration we aim to foster as we sustainably grow Canada’s ocean economy.”

The announcement was held at Kraken’s newest facility in Mount Pearl, Newfoundland and Labrador.

About OceanVision™

OceanVision™ is a proposed 3-year project focused on the development of new marine technologies and products to enable an underwater robotics data acquisition and data analytics as a service business. It brings together multiple partners across sectors, leveraging emerging technology to capture and monetize ocean data. A high value activity for Canada’s ocean economy, it is aimed to assist Canada’s ocean operators in reducing the costs and risks of operating in ocean environments. The opportunity for further cross sectoral collaboration is present as additional stakeholders become involved and products are added to its scope – including the latest SMEs technologies and innovations.