Mary-Louise Hoffman
The Space and Naval Warfare Systems Center Pacific plans to award Liquid Robotics a potential five-year, $10 million contract to engineer an autonomous unmanned surface vehicle for the U.S. Navy.
The Navy said April 28 in a FedBizOpps notice the contract will cover an estimated 18,668 hours of Wave Glider USV hardware design, production, assembly, integration, testing, repair, system upgrade and training support.
According to the Navy, the vehicle will be built to use solar or wave energy and to operate autonomously for a duration of up to 10 months and at a range of up to 1,000 nautical miles.
The contract also includes support for the service branch’s projects to develop and implement maritime surveillance systems using autonomous USVs and related sensor and payload technologies.
SSC Pacific expects to complete the contract award action by July 1.
