Bedrock Ocean Exploration Acquires Shone Automation Technology Assets to Expand Ocean Mapping Data Services

Bedrock Ocean Exploration, an ocean-mapping data company creating the world’s first detailed commercial and publicly available data library of the ocean, today announced the acquisition of core technology and software from Shone Automation Inc. This purchase will help expand on a first-of-its-kind ocean mapping data offering that supports offshore wind development and tangential ocean infrastructure markets. Shone’s nautical charts backend technology will integrate into Bedrock’s Mosaic™ software and its autonomous electric AUV system to enhance its mission planning and marine domain awareness while surveying and accessing fully web-based, vector basemaps of global electronic nautical chart data in the browser for the first time ever. 

Initially, the marine industry relied on RNCs (Raster Nautical Charts), which only showed printed images, but did not allow for data queries. This problem was partially solved with the creation of electronic-based ENCs (Electronic Nautical Charts), which provided vector data that can be shown on registered electronic screens, but failed to provide a deeper level of interaction with the underlying data on many different devices. Shone’s technology and implementation will be the latest advancement in the evolution of nautical chart data. It will solve problems that previous methods missed, enabling a whole new category of high-quality maritime web applications and system developments called Web Nautical Charts (WNC’s)*.
 
The acquired products include a backend database creation pipeline from worldwide hydrographic offices data, a nautical charts front-end style generation pipeline and libraries, a vector tile server for web-based chart rendering, and an API & database schema for native use on any Linux computer. Combining Bedrock’s Mosaic™ platform with Shone’s software will enhance Bedrock’s data offerings and allow the ocean mapping data company to quickly provide context to publicly accessible data for governments, individuals, and organizations in the hopes of fighting climate change.

“As we imagine a future world, connecting the information paths is paramount to the fluidity, simplicity, and effectiveness of our manned and unmanned decision-making process,” says Charles Chiau, CTO and co-founder of Bedrock. “Gaining ease of access to subsea data from a survey perspective is only a singular view of a multidimensional challenge. This acquisition fast tracks a part of a grander vision, and we are fortunate to have Shone’s co-founders, Ugo and Antoine, lead the charge in our integration to empower our clients with usable information to act.”
 
Integrating Shone’s software into Bedrock’s cloud platform will create a truly global, web-based ENC that is interactable in any web browser. The vector tile data is optimized for web-viewing and live interaction of all ENC data from server to client with a few API calls. Shone’s software is necessary for full web application baselayers, cloud-based mission planning with a complete picture of marine navigational contexts, and the development of autonomous maritime navigation systems. Bedrock can now query data for properties such as buoy intervals or local water depth and interact with map symbols and areas of interest. Since this is a fully cloud-native implementation, it is truly scalable far beyond the current systems. 

Incorporating WNC basemaps will expand Mosaic™, Bedrock’s cloud-based data platform, which currently holds the spot as the largest immediately accessible & downloadable, free database of publicly available ocean mapping data. Shone’s technology will help drive Bedrock’s proprietary algorithms, enabling the platform to build apps on top of nautical chart datasets. It will also provide live context for rich visualization of all raw and processed multibeam echosounder data and side-scan sonar data for all Mosaic™ users.

In the future, the company also plans to expand its ocean mapping data offerings to support climate change initiatives more broadly. Renewable energy companies interested in using Bedrock’s data for offshore wind development can learn more by visiting Bedrock’s website: https://www.bedrockocean.com/. 

About Bedrock Ocean Exploration, PBC
Bedrock, founded in 2020, is a public benefit corporation and current Seabed 2030 partner, combining proprietary AUV technology with a universal survey data cloud platform to reduce the time, environmental impact, and cost associated with seafloor exploration. Bedrock’s technological advancements will accelerate offshore wind development by drastically reducing the time necessary for construction to begin on these projects.  

*WNCs charts not authorized for navigational use

Contact Information

Merrita Llarena

PR for Bedrock Ocean Exploration

VSC for Bedrock Ocean Exploration

press@bedrockocean.com