Team Nessie Seek Sponsorship

Team Nessie of Herriot-Watt University, Edinburgh, are seeking sponsors for the upcoming 2010 Student Autonomous Underwater Competition, Europe (SAUC-E). The hard work put in by the team during the last few years paid off, since the team has already won twice. Team Nessie's AUV is not just a competition vehicle, but a reliable research platform, robust and easy to operate for the needs of the Ocean Systems Laboratory (OSL).

Succeeding from Nessie III, Nessie IV has established itself as the new research platform of choice in the OSL, due to its small two-man deployable form factor and an open, extensible hardware and software architecture. The team are now satisfied with the current hardware design of Nessie IV as a very capable hover AUV.

All efforts for SAUC-E 2010 are being put into constructing a new torpedo-shaped vehicle. The new torpedo vehicle (as yet unnamed, currently Nessie VT), is planned to be far more hydrodynamic than Nessie IV. Nessie VT will improve on its maximum forward speed, while retaining a high degree of hover manoeuvrability i.e. 6 degrees of freedom in order to inspect an underwater installation or point of interest from any angle. The design and build of this vehicle began last year in tandem with the upgrades for Nessie IV, but budget issues are preventing the team from completing the project. The aim is to reuse as much as possible of the expertise and knowledge gathered with the Nessie family of vehicles.

Nessie VT is ready for mounting sensors and thrusters, and new faster processing hardware for the vehicle has been tested. However, the most expensive components including the thrusters, Doppler velocity logger and fibre-optic gyroscope are yet to be purchased.

The students ask that you consider sponsoring Team Nessie in 2010, to allow them to continue development of this new cutting-edge research platform. The exposure of the sponsors will be incredibly high profile for the 2010 competition, since it is being held at the NATO SACLANT Undersea Research Centre, La Spezia, Italy.

Sponsoring opportunities for the team have been divided into three categories to help sponsors choose their level of involvement: Platinum (£4,000 or more); Gold (£2,000 or more); and Silver (£1,000 or more). Sponsors will have their name or logo featured on all team publicity at SAUC-E 2010. Gold and platinum sponsors will be given the opportunity to display a transfer of their logo on the vehicle, with high visibility for the platinum. All sponsors will be invited to attend SAUC-E 2010. Parties in attendance will include representatives from the industrial and military sub-sea communities.

Funding from high-profile sponsors has been crucial for the success of the team to date, and with further sponsorship they are confident of success at SAUC-E 2010 and in enabling interesting new research activities within the OSL.

For more information or to discuss sponsorship, please contact Francesco Maurelli at [email protected].