Small Vessel Detection and Tracking

As an island nation, the sea provides the UK with an important line of defence to protect it from unwanted visitors. However, the marine domain is a notoriously difficult and dangerous environment in which to operate which makes traditional patrolling surveillance methods expensive. As a result, the country's maritime monitoring capabilities are now very limited at a time when there is increasing need to have situational awareness of UK territorial waters.

SiriusInsight has developed a capability to use artificial intelligence to analyse remotely sourced data (both satellite and terrestrial) which avoids the need for human involvement in either the data collection or its processing.

SiriusInsight will use its InnovateUK Smart Grant to develop further this capability in order to detect and identify smaller vessels of the kind commonly used in the smuggling of drugs, people and contraband. In so doing, it brings together state-of-art approaches in artificial intelligence, computer vision, pattern of life analysis and anomaly detection that can be used for monitoring and alerting in a way which will greatly enhance coverage at minimal cost relative to the alternatives. This technology has a wide range of monitoring applications and potential users including Maritime Coastguard (sea safety and environment), Border Force (illegal migration and smuggling) and DEFRA (fishery protection).

Real-time situational awareness based on the SiriusInsight product can also be used to enhance collision avoidance for commercial shipping with particular application for vessels with restricted ability to manoeuvre (like survey vessels) and autonomous shipping. There are also applications for enhanced pattern of life analysis in planning for offshore developments like wind farms.

Combining artificial intelligence with the marine domain brings together two areas where the UK has the opportunity to continue as a world leader. The InnovateUK grant will not only secure employment in the UK for leading AI engineers but also help SiriusInsight maintain the country's leading position in this field.