earth science

Saildrone (company)

Saildrone (company) is a earth science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Saildrone (company) rather than just read about it. In short: Saildrone, Inc. is an American company based in Alameda, California, that designs, manufactures, and operates a fleet of unmanned/uncrewed surface vehicles (USVs), or ocean drones, known as "saildrones". The company was founded by engineer Richard Jenkins in 2012.

Key takeaways

Saildrone (company) belongs to earth science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Saildrone (company) to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Saildrone (company) from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Saildrone, Inc. is an American company based in Alameda, California, that designs, manufactures, and operates a fleet of unmanned/uncrewed surface vehicles (USVs), or ocean drones, known as "saildrones". The company was founded by engineer Richard Jenkins in 2012. Saildrone customers and research partners include the various departments of the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration NASA, the US Navy, US Coast Guard, the University of New Hampshire, the University of Rhode Island, the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (Australia), the European Center for Medium-range Weather Forecasts, GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel (Germany), the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute, and others.

History

Founding (2012-2018) Saildrone was founded by Richard Jenkins in 2012. In 2014, Saildrone began a partnership with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory under a Cooperative Research and Development Agreement to develop and refine vehicle capabilities and payload of sensors. Objectives included acoustic fisheries surveys for management and conservation while also collecting metocean data. Also in 2014, Saildrone and NOAA’s Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory established a public-private partnership to develop and refine the meteorological and oceanographic sensor suite for the Saildrone USV. In 2016, Saildrone closed a $14 million Series A funding round. The round was led by Social Capital and included Capricorn Investment Group and Lux Capital. Saildrone had previously received mission-related investment from The Schmidt Family Foundation, a private foundation created by Eric and Wendy Schmidt.

Projects and funding (2017-2025) In 2017, two saildrones deployed from San Francisco took part in the NASA-funded Salinity Processes in the Upper-ocean Regional Study 2 (SPURS-2) field campaign as part of their more than six-month Tropical Pacific Observing System (TPOS)-2020 pilot study in the eastern tropical Pacific. The mission compared saildrone measurements with those of the research vessel Revelle and the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) SPURS-2 buoy. The data collected by the saildrones was found to be in agreement with the ship and buoy, and demonstrated the saildrone to be “an effective platform for observing a wide range of oceanographic variables important to air-sea interaction studies,” according to a paper published in Oceanography. In 2018, the website DroneBelow reported the company raised a $60 million Series B funding round to scale operations with participation from Horizons Ventures as well as existing investors Social Capital, Capricorn Investment Group, and Lux Capital. In October 2020, the U.S. Coast Guard Research and Development Center in Hawaii began a 30-day test to "assess low-cost, commercially available autonomous solutions to improve maritime domain awareness in remote regions of the Pacific Ocean." Saildrone was one of two platforms tested. In 2021, TechCrunch reported the company had raised a $100 million Series C funding round led by Mary Meeker's investment fund Bond Capital with participation from new investors XN, Standard Investments, Emerson Collective, Crowley Maritime Corporation, as well as previous investors Capricorn's Technology Impact Fund, Lux Capital, Social Capital, and Tribe Capital. In 2022, the Saildrone Surveyor was recognized with the Innovation Award from the Blue Marine Foundation and BOAT International's annual Ocean Awards for revolutionizing ocean mapping. The company says that with 20 Saildrone Surveyors, it should be possible to achieve Seabed 2030's goal of mapping the world's oceans in high resolution by the end of the decade. Saildrone published its first carbon impact report in 2022. At the Navy League of the United States's annual Sea Air Space conference, Saildrone announced it has appointed Vice Admiral (ret.) John Mustin, as its first president. Mustin served most recently as the 15th Chief of Navy Reserve, and was formerly the Vice Commander of the United States Fleet Forces Command.

Vehicles A saildrone is a sailboat-like vehicle equipped with science-grade sensors and machine-learning technology to deliver critical data and intelligence from the ocean. There are three Saildrone platforms: Explorer, Voyager, and Surveyor. All three Saildrone uncrewed surface vehicles (USVs) combine wind-powered propulsion technology with solar-powered meteorological and oceanographic acoustic, and ISR sensors.

Saildrone Explorer The Saildrone Explorer is a 23-foot-long (7.0 m) USV that can sail at an average speed of 3 knots (5.6 km/h; 3.5 mph) (depending on the wind) and stay at sea for up to 365 days. The Explorer is designed for fisheries missions, metocean data collection, ecosystem monitoring, and satellite calibration and validation missions.

Saildrone Voyager In August 2021, Seapower Magazine reported the company is adding a new mid-size USV to the fleet: The Voyager is a 33-foot-long (10 m) USV with primary wind power and auxiliary propulsion of a 4kW electric motor for a wide variety of missions including bathymetry (ocean mapping) missions, border patrol and maritime domain awareness. The average speed is 5 knots.

… excerpt ends here. Continue reading the full article.

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Saildrone (company)

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Saildrone (company) claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In earth science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Saildrone (company) before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Saildrone (company) ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Saildrone (company)

In research: Saildrone (company) appears in earth science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Saildrone (company) in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Saildrone (company) is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics Companies based in Alameda, California, Data companies, Oceanographic instrumentation, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Saildrone (company) outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Saildrone (company) in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Saildrone (company) means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Saildrone (company) out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Saildrone (company) in simple terms?

Why does Saildrone (company) matter?

Because it connects several earth science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Saildrone (company)?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Saildrone (company).