2023 Ocean Tech Challenge

What is the Ocean Tech Challenge? Who are this year’s winners? What are they working on - and why? All this, plus why partnership is powerful and how you can tap into that power.

For more info, or to get involved, connect with us or one of the Ocean Tech Challenge founding partners:
Ocean Technology Council of Nova Scotia (OTCNS)
Twitter: @OceanTechNS
LinkedIn: Ocean Technology Council of Nova Scotia
Innovate UK
Twitter: @innovateuk
Facebook: @innovateuk
Instagram: @weareinnovateuk
LinkedIn: Innovate UK
For even more oceans expertise:
Centre for Ocean Ventures and Entrepreneurship (COVE)
Twitter: @COVE_Ocean
Facebook: @COVEoceanNS
Instagram: @coveoceanns
LinkedIn: COVE

#oceantech #innovation #atlanticcanada #canada #unitedkingdom

Narration – Thousands of nautical miles separate Canada's East Coast and the United Kingdom. In the ocean tech sector, that divide is starting to feel smaller, as two countries come together to harness the power of partnership.
Text – The Canada-UK Ocean Tech Challenge
Chris Bourque, Executive Director, Ocean Technology Council of Nova Scotia (OTCNS), Halifax, NS, Canada – The challenge is a project designed to help support partnerships between UK and Canadian companies.
Matt Johnson, Economic Development Manager, ACOA, Halifax, NS, Canada – To solve complex issues within the ocean environment.
David Golding, Deputy Director - Global, Innovate UK, Swindon, England, UK – In the first year of the challenge, Canadian and UK companies came together, to form teams, to develop ways to help uncrewed vessels navigate more safely.
Matt Johnson – Sometimes you have only part of a solution, and if you were to work in your silo and try to bring that solution to market, you could be years.
Text – The First Wave of Winners
Andy Smerdon, Managing Director, Aquatec, Basingstoke, England, UK – This is Gary Dinn.
Gary Dinn, CTO, eSonar, St. John’s, NL, Canada – This is Andy Smerdon.
Gary Dinn – The biggest impact of the technology we're working on is to expand the area of safe navigation.
Andy Smerdon – And in turn that means that more data will be gathered from under the oceans, which can feed back to the authorities and then even to the general public.
Gary Dinn – A good example would be in Canada's North, where many of the bays and inlets have never been surveyed.
Alan Parslow, CEO, Deep Vision, Dartmouth, NS, Canada – My teammate is Nick Tudor.
Nick Tudor, CEO, D-RisQ, Malvern, England, UK – This is Alan Parslow.
Alan Parslow – What we're doing is actually enabling truly autonomous systems, which is edge AI. So it's actually taking place without remote control, nobody staring at a screen. Something can go off and do its job because it can perceive the environment.
Nick Tudor – You need to have the trust that the vehicle is going to do what you want it to do, but crucially, not do the things that you don't want it to do - ever.
Alan Parslow – That's going to be good for not just the environment, but also for all Canadians.
Nick Tudor – We're looking to make sure that people can take on these technologies and enable others to do fantastic things.
Text – The Power of Partnership
Melanie Nadeau, CEO, Centre for Ocean Ventures & Entrepreneurship (COVE), Dartmouth, NS, Canada – Partnerships are extremely important and powerful in a space like the ocean sector because there are so many vast opportunities and challenges.
David Golding – No one company or country has all of solutions.
Andy Smerdon – When we work with with other companies, we can draw on their experience.
Alan Parslow – Each company and bring to the other what that company is looking for.
Gary Dinn – So it allows you to get to a result quicker.
Andy Smerdon – It creates something bigger.
Gary Dinn – This is going to open up new markets for us.
Nick Tudor – This is giving us the opportunity to work with Canada, Innovate UK and ocean tech partners over here.
Chris Bourque – We get to motivate really innovative companies.
David Golding – Helping them look at how they build partnerships.
Matt Johnson – Helping them bring their innovative solutions to market.
Andy Smerdon – It's often the way that the new ideas get developed is to work with partners like ACOA just to help push and direct that development.
Melanie Nadeau – Collaboration has got to be key to the way that we move forward.
Text - Get involved. Learn more. Reach out talk to: the Ocean Tech Council of Nova Scotia, Innovate UK, COVE or ACOA. #oceantechchallenge