Ocius press release
At a Christening ceremony following the Annual General Meeting of Ocius held on Thursday 24 November 2022, RADM Pete Quinn Head of Navy Capability made the announcement.
He said “Over five years as HNC it has been fantastic being involved with Ocius and seeing Australian technology at the forefront. Systems like Ocius Bluebottles are really important to our strategy. We have vast areas we need to patrol, and we have to and will be investing in uncrewed platforms that will be out there persistently conducting surveillance.”
“This contract makes Ocius a Defence Prime; not a big one… but from little things big things grow to be a long-lasting Defence Prime we need two things – innovative products and people”
Robert Dane, Ocius CEO
He went on “Any innovative product will one day not be innovative – it will become the benchmark so Ocius must have continuous innovation of our Bluebottles, iDrogue, Loyal Shipmate and other products and create a culture where our people, University of NSW academics and subcontractors feel the excitement of innovation.”
Robert also noted that in the last 15 months, five Bluebottles under a Defence Innovation Hub contract had completed nearly 23,000 nautical miles at sea which was equivalent to around the world at the equator.
Christening of Hulls # 8 BARRA and # 9 BOMBORA
Ocius shareholders and staff were joined by RAN, UNSW and Industry partners to celebrate the Christening of two Bluebottles BARRA and BOMBORA.
Former Chief of Defence Forces, Chief Air Marshall Mark Binskin AC was also an honoured guest.
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Naval News comments:
Earlier this year, Thales and Ocius Technologies entered a Teaming Agreement to advance the development and deployment of a the Bluebottle equipped for Anti-Submarine Warfare (ASW) and surveillance missions – helping to protect Australia’s borders.
The Australian designed and manufactured Blue Sentry autonomous system, comprising a team of Ocius Bluebottle USVs integrated with Thales Australia’s new thin line Fibre Optic Towed Array capability, are deployed from shore to autonomously patrol large areas of Australia’s coastline, performing underwater ISR (Intelligence, Surveillance, Reconnaissance) missions for long periods of time at sea, and in extreme weather conditions.
