Page 27 - memoria_hisdesat_2020

Participation in

Mayflower

exactEarth Limited, a company owned by Hisdesat,
joined an international effort led by ProMare and its
technology partner IBM, to build a fully autonomous,
unmanned transatlantic research vessel, which was
to be launched on the fourth centenary of the May-
flower’s original voyage (newsroom.ibm.com/then-
and-now).

The Mayflower Autonomous Ship
(MAS) mission will not only comme-
morate the original Mayflower cros-
sing, but also develop technologies
that could transform the shipping in-

dustry, as well as helping to collect cri-
tical data about the ocean.

exactEarth will contribute two of its services to the
MAS project:

+ ExactAIS: the provision of live satellite AIS data
to the mission operations centre, where this data will
augment the local AIS images collected by the AIS
transceiver on board the ship, by providing a real-time
view of the horizon throughout the entire journey.

+ ExactSeNS: the use of ExactEarth’s VHF-based
M2M satellite communications service to upload re-
al-time sensor data from the ship’s weather station, © exactEarth
via an onboard transmitter supplied by exactEarth.

The AIS Exact Data Service provides flexible access mobile SatCom service that can collect sensor data
to all AIS messages captured by exactView™ RT, the from a range of marine assets, including ships, buoys,
Company’s second generation satellite constellation. autonomous and environmental platforms and navi-
ExactView RT consists of 65 operational payloads and gation aids. ASM forms part of the evolution of the
seven orbital substitutes that were designed and built standard from an “Automatic Identification System”
by L3Harris Corporation and are housed aboard the (AIS) to a “VHF Data Exchange System” (VDES).
Iridium NEXT constellation of satellites, which is owned
and operated by Iridium Communications Inc. Exac- We are thus contributing to the future of global shi-
tView RT tracks more than 500,000 unique vessels pping, while remaining committed to environmental
worldwide and generates average global review rates protection of the oceans. This is a unique opportunity
and average latency rates of less than one minute. to test exactSeNS as part of an initiative that, if suc-
cessful, could lead to greater adoption of autonomous
ExactSeNS uses VHF maritime “Application Spe- shipping, as well as to demonstrate how the service
cific Messages” (ASM) frequencies and AIS satellite could create new opportunities for exactEarth in the
payloads from exactEarth to provide a real-time global maritime information market.

ANNUAL REPORT 2020 | HISDESAT | 27