Page 35: of Marine Technology Magazine (Sep/Oct 2026)

ANATOMY OF AN UNMANNED VEHICLE

Element Details

USVs use monohull, catamaran, trimaran, or SWATH designs (aluminum, carbon ? ber, compos-

Hull ites); AUVs use cylindrical/torpedo pressure hulls (aluminum, titanium, composites) with hydrody- namic shells, ballast/trim systems, and ? ooded sections.

Combustion engines, electric motors, sails, solar, or buoyancy engines (gliders) with battery stor-

Propulsion age for energy conversion. Propellers, water jets, or thrusters for propulsion. Rudders, ? ns and thrusters (plus elevators for AUVs) for vectoring.

USVs use GPS/GNSS, IMU, and DVL. AUVs lack underwater GPS, so rely on INS, DVL, depth sen-

Navigation & guidance sors, acoustic positioning (USBL/LBL), and terrain-relative navigation.

Radar, electro-optical and infrared cameras, LiDAR, sonar, and environmental sensors support

Sensors & perception obstacle detection, mapping, and monitoring.

Command, control, & Onboard autopilot computers, RF/satellite/cellular wireless links, and shore-based control stations. communication AUVs add acoustic modems for underwater comms.

Follows a sense-plan-act loop: perception (sensor fusion, object detection), localization (GNSS+IMU+DVL fusion), planning (path planning, COLREGs-compliant obstacle avoidance),

Autonomy software control (actuator commands), and mission supervision (fault handling). Digital twins are commonly used for pre-deployment testing.

GPU-class edge AI modules for perception, a CPU for mission/control logic, optional FPGAs for

Compute stack real-time signal processing, all packaged in rugged, low-power, redundant hardware.

Mission-speci? c gear (sonar variants, cameras, environmental sensors, magnetometers, sub-bot-

Payload systems tom pro? lers, etc.) or defense payloads (surveillance, mine countermeasures, strike, etc.).

Lights/AIS, fail-safe return-to-home logic, recovery hardware. AUVs add leak detection, watch-

Safety dog-triggered surfacing, and emergency ballast release.

Source: Intelatus Global Partners ing number of venture-backed start-ups emerging in the U.S. manned maritime systems players:

While these companies ostensibly target both defense and • Canada’s Kraken Robotics ($615 million) acquired commercial applications, many are scaling on the back of U.S. the UK's Covelya Group, including Sonardyne,

Navy programs, signaling a potential shift in naval procure- EIVA, Forcys, Wavefront Systems, Voyis, and Chelsea ment toward a “build