VENUS Unmanned Surface Vessel Team

Singapore Technologies (ST) Engineering, DSO National Laboratories (DSO), Defence Science and Technology Agency (DTSA), and the Republic of Singapore Navy (RSN)

CITATION

The VENUS Unmanned Surface Vessel (USV) Team, comprising members from ST Engineering’s Electronics sector, DSO, DSTA and RSN, indigenously developed the VENUS USV. The VENUS USV is equipped with a wide range of sensors, including a combination of electro-optical and radar sensors, which allow it to navigate autonomously in Singapore’s dense maritime environment. Designed with a modular payload option, the multi-role USV can also be easily adapted to conduct various missions, ranging from coastal patrols to underwater surveillance. The USV enables the RSN to perform mine-countermeasure and maritime security missions with lesser manpower and at much lower cost compared to manned naval ships. In recognition of its significant achievements, the team is awarded the DTP 2018 Team (Research & Development) Award.

ABOUT THE VENUS USV TEAM

The VENUS USV Team embarked on the development of the VENUS USV in 2008, successfully undertaking several research and technology programmes related to autonomous navigation intelligence and mission applications in the process. This resulted in the development of indigenous capabilities such as perception, collision detection and avoidance, manoeuvre autonomy, and payload integration for different mission applications.

It is a success story of close co-operation of the team comprising ST Engineering Electronics, DSO, DSTA and RSN in a closely-knitted and well executed R&T program. The multi-disciplinary team made valuable contributions in their respective fields of expertise and domain knowledge.

TECHNICAL INNOVATION AND OPERATIONAL IMPACT

1. Autonomy

The VENUS USV is fully autonomous and customised to operate in Singapore’s busy waters. Its main “drive chain” for autonomy is its sensor processing and fusion, and machine intelligence modules, capable of collision avoidance, close-in-station keeping and control.

Perception sensor processing is capable of tracking any surface obstacle, stationary or moving, with fast heading updates to readily calculate collision encounters.

Manoeuvre autonomy is designed to handle a large amount of obstacles and sieve out those on urgent collision encounters. The USV would then manoeuvre via precision guidance and control to avoid the obstacles.

DSO developed obstacle avoidance and close-in-station keeping algorithms that enable the vessel to navigate safely in accordance with International Regulations for Preventing Collisions at Sea (COLREGS) even when it is pursuing a target in high speed.

Together with the RSN, DSTA conducted rigorous technical assessments and feasibility studies in developing the vessel. This included the design and integration of the automatic Launch and Recovery System for the Towed Synthetic Aperture Sonar, which enables the USV to conduct underwater scans of the seabed safely. As the overall programme manager for the VENUS USV, DSTA also oversaw the integration work for the USV’s navigation, autonomy, safety and sensor systems.

2. USV System

ST Engineering Electronics is responsible for the system development and architecting of the USV, pioneering efforts in areas that include machine perception, sensor fusion, manoeuvre guidance, shore control and ship-to-shore communication service development.

The high level of autonomy in the VENUS USV is a high-order engineering feat realised by designing and building the USV platform to the following objectives:

1. All round visibility by applying sensor fusion to reduce errors by the radar and vision sensors in azimuth resolution and range
2. Technological breakthroughs in suppressing false alarms and obstacle size estimation for radar, and sub-second fast track initiation for vision sensors to provide a near-zero miss obstacle detection and tracking capability, in both day and night.
3. Manoeuvre guidance and autonomy customised for congested waters with automatic activations of safe-interventions in exception cases.
4. Dual propulsion system for high platform availability.
5. Repertoire of communication systems for robust connectivity between ship and shore where the channel with highest link quality is selected for transmission.

PROFILE OF TEAM LEADER