Update: Ocius to integrate ThayerMahan, Thales sonar systems onto Bluebottle USVs
Ocius' Bluebottle surveillance USVs in operation during a Royal Australian Navy (RAN)-led experimentation activity at Jervis Bay in 2023. (Commonwealth of Australia)
Sydney-based Ocius Technology is integrating sonar systems from Connecticut-based ThayerMahan and Thales Australia onto its Bluebottle unmanned surface vehicles (USVs) to enhance persistent intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) operations.
Ocius announced on 25 August that it is procuring ThayerMahan's Outpost and Thales Australia's BlueSentry sonar systems, both of which feature fully retractable thin-line acoustic arrays (TLAs).
Ocius said it has contracted ThayerMahan for 40 Outpost systems to support the delivery of 40 Bluebottle USVs to the Royal Australian Navy (RAN) under an AUD176 million (USD125.8 million) contract awarded to the company in March.
An Ocius spokesperson told Janes on 26 August that the 40 Outposts will be delivered over the next four years, with the first system delivery commencing mid-2027. Bluebottles integrated with Outpost will be deployed to the RAN's Maritime Autonomous Systems Unit (MASU) to monitor undersea threats, the spokesperson said. MASU is a new RAN formation launched in April to lead unmanned maritime operations.
Ocius said Outpost combines passive anti-submarine warfare (ASW)-capable towed sonar arrays with ThayerMahan's TransparenSea processing software, a data analytics platform designed to fuse acoustic information from multiple sources and generate actionable intelligence.
The system will form part of a distributed surveillance architecture to detect and track threats and deliver data to commanders, Ocius added.
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