JUNE 17, 2021
We consulted our business navigational charts and set our sights on Autonomy and AI in last year’s article on the 58m Tempo concept. We examined all our onboard systems and tested our ideas for sea-worthiness in our SuperYacht Times article last fall. We brought supplies on board and even a few collaborator friends like Dave Scheidt at Weather Gage Technologies in our Autonomy and AI webinar last December, Autonomy – A Yacht Revolution. And for the last 9 months, we have been fully underway with our team working feverishly on the DARPA NOMARS (NO MAnning Required Ship) program which includes Autonomy and AI elements. Our course is set, and now we look forward to racing in tandem with Leidos in our future Autonomy and AI endeavors.
As of May 7th, Leidos, a Technology company renowned for innovation in the areas of science and engineering, officially acquired Gibbs & Cox, Inc., of which DLBA Naval Architects is an operating division. This business combination significantly expands the technology and benefits that DLBA can extend to our customers through the leveraged experience and expertise that Leidos brings both on top of and underneath the water.
Some notable autonomous Leidos vessels on top of the water include including Sea Hunter and Seahawk for the US Navy. Just launched in April 2021, Seahawk is a 132’ (40m) long, 145 ton, high endurance trimaran. To be used as a technology demonstrator for the US Government, it is a platform designed specifically not just for high endurance, but also for high reliability and high availability.
Underneath the waves, Leidos has spearheaded such projects as the R/V Pathfinder, which is a research vessel built to collect data in an at-sea operational environment and instantaneously communicate the data to multiple locations. Its underwater capabilities were tested at the Navy’s Advanced Naval Technology Exercise. The vessel surveyed the sea floor and immediately transmitted ocean and meteorological data to naval offices in Newport, Rhode Island, and Panama City, Florida.
There are so many possibilities with knowledgeable collaborators in our corner. We are eager to explore the possibilities available in combining the experience that Leidos brings to the table with all the knowledge we have been gleaning over to past few years to new yachting projects.
DLBA Naval Architects
860 Greenbrier Circle, Suite 201 Chesapeake, Virginia 23320 USA
Phone: 757-545-3700 | Fax: 757-545-8227 | dlba@gibbscox.com
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