Nortek Navigation Days: connecting our global navigation community

Events designed to foster the sharing of ideas and expertise

The five Navigation Days took place in Aberdeen, UK; Singapore; Fremantle, Australia; Trondheim, Norway; and Boston, USA. Each event consisted of presentations from Nortek’s navigation experts, often showcasing the latest developments such as the Nucleus1000 or Compact DVL series. Nortek DVL users gave presentations and live demonstrations. Attendees also enjoyed networking and socializing over local food and drinks.

“It was great to bring a diverse group of people together who are working on autonomous navigation projects for maritime,” says Nortek USA Director Dan Ritchie. “There is clear evidence that we will see rapid growth over the next several years for subsea and surface vessels in both defense and commercial applications.”

Ritchie notes the importance of collaboration during this time of growth and change.

“That growth will be paired with demand for greater capabilities. Vehicles will be expected to dive deeper, have greater endurance, and perform dedicated tasks,” he says. “In bringing together engineers and business developers, this can create a path to identify areas to collaborate or leverage each other’s technology to work towards improvement.”

The Boston Navigation Day on 15 November concluded the global series of Navigation Days for 2022

With the expanding subsea vehicle market becoming increasingly varied, Nortek used its unique position as a common ground between many vehicle designers, integrators and operators to bring together knowledge and experiences from the latest advancements in this space.

Live demonstrations from industry leaders

Seeing a vehicle in action is often the best way to understand its function. Attendees of the Navigation Days experienced live in-water demonstrations from partners’ vehicles at each location. These ranged from Vortex NTNU’s tethered ROV deployed in a fjord near Trondheim to Bayonet Ocean Vehicles’ crawler demonstrating some “off-roading” skills going up and down a staircase in Boston.

Bayonet Ocean Vehicles demonstrated the capability of their crawler by driving it on some atypical terrain to get it to the Boston Navigation Day.

These demonstrations also sparked conversations about the future of navigation technology and how different innovations work in tandem to expand possibilities.

“As the industry continues to develop its remote and autonomous solutions, it was fantastic to have HydroSurv demo their USV complete with Signature1000 ADCP and Nucleus sensors in Aberdeen,” says Nortek UK Director Scott Gray, recalling the Navigation Day in Aberdeen. “Having these units integrated allows for increased navigation ability and high-quality data collection in areas where GPS is limited, such as windfarms.”

Enjoying the ability to connect and network

Aberdeen is well-known in the navigation industry as a center for subsea navigation. As such, the Aberdeen Navigation Day was well-attended and well-reviewed.

USVs open many doors for missions on the sea surface to be completed without requiring any crew members on board. This USV was equipped with a Nortek Signature1000 and Nucleus for current profiling and navigational capabilities.

“It was a great spread of topics and speakers in a really novel location, which worked very well with the waterside access,” says David Owen, ROV Technical Manager at Seatronics, who attended the Aberdeen Navigation Day. “It was also great to catch up with so many people again after the last few years. I can appreciate the time, effort and costs that go into pulling these sorts of events together, so well done once again and thanks for having me there.”

The Aberdeen Navigation Day made for a great opportunity for networking and socialization between industry leaders.

Events with global reach

While Nortek’s HQ may be located far north, the navigation community is wide-reaching. Events in Singapore and Australia touched on a subsea navigation hub for SE Asia and a quickly growing market in the south, bringing together key players in the industry.

“It’s important for us to work closely and to support each other in business,” says Yarran Crichton, Nortek’s Director for Australia, New Zealand and SE Asia. “If there’s one thing we’ve learned of late, it’s that there’s nothing better than a face-to-face event to build those foundations.”

The event in Singapore was organized by Nortek partners Sea and Land Technologies.

The well-attended Singapore event was largely supported and organized by the region’s Nortek representatives, Sea and Land Technologies. “Sea and Land were a vital part of making the day a success,” notes Crichton. “Also crucial to the day was our Business Development Manager for our navigation-based products Rory Findlay. His expert knowledge and the transparent nature of his presentation kept attendees engaged and interactive throughout the event.”

Findlay gave presentations at the Navigation Days in Singapore and Fremantle, as well as in Aberdeen and Trondheim. Here he is demonstrating Nortek’s latest advancement in navigation sensors, the Nucleus1000.

The Australia event in Fremantle gathered a similar crowd, enabling members of a quickly growing industry to collaborate and discuss their respective solutions. “We are seeing such a rise in activity,” says Crichton. “The opportunity to engage with both new and existing businesses and show the solutions we offer is essential to spread awareness of what is possible with modern subsea technology.”

The event in Fremantle was supported by presentations from Beex and C2 Robotics. Attendees enjoyed a demonstration of the SRS Fusion, a compact vehicle with a custom integration of a Nortek DVL. “Thanks to David Whillas from Topaz Subsea for the demonstration!” says Crichton.

Future events to bring together ocean communities

Nortek plans to continue to host Navigation Days and Oceanographic Days (similar events geared towards ADCP users) globally.

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