Atlantic Canada and Nova Scotia, in particular, is home to a strong cluster of ocean industries and to ground breaking ocean research. This region is quickly becoming a globally recognised hub of oceans expertise with the potential to be a significant contributor to a number of Global Value Chains associated with the oceans sector, including, but not limited to, Marine Defence, Marine Energy, Marine Observation, Fisheries and Aquaculture Technology, Marine Tourism and
Halifax hosts the Centre for Ocean Ventures & Entrepreneurship (COVE), the globally acclaimed Bedford Institute of Oceanography (BIO) and a short drive away on the Bay of Fundy the Fundy Ocean Research for Energy (FORCE) is located. The H2O Home to Overseas Conference is an ideal event to engage with local ocean technology industry. The Conference will include: ocean industry showcase, international delegates, research, development and commercialisation presentations and the oceans gala dinner. This year’s keynote gala dinner speaker is Kevin Forshaw, Associate Director, Innovation and Enterprise, National Oceanography Centre whose presentation is entitled, “Innovation to Enable
More presentations to be added so check back.
Click a title to read more:
Moderator: Kes Morton, President and CEO, Pisces Research Project Management
Autonomous vehicles in the ocean provide well known benefits for the owners, but also an opportunity for the ocean community to innovate. The advantages of autonomous vehicles over manned vessels are well known – they are less expensive, safer, can go farther. However, not everyone owns an ocean-going autonomous vehicle (yet) and like manned vessels, autonomous vehicles can often accomplish multiple purposes in a single mission, bringing people, sectors and industries together. At the same time there is an ever-growing demand for increased ocean data which is driving innovation of autonomous vehicle integrated devices. The result is the ocean community collaborating to meet this need, often through shared use of autonomous vehicles. This panel will present specific examples of autonomous vehicles nucleating partnerships and innovation, followed by an open discussion on how the ocean community can capitalize on this opportunity.
Download presentation : Pisces Research Project Management
Download presentation : Deep Vision
Presenters: Aaron Stevenson, CEO, Ashored Innovations Inc.; Colin Ross, CEO, Acoubit Communications; Mike Smit, Co-Founder, BlueNode; Sheamus MacDonald, CEO, Happy Fish Technologies; Ulas¸ Güntürkün, CEO, Marecomms; and Franziska Broell, CEO, Maritime BioLoggers
These six presenting companies mark the first cohort accepted into Start-Up Yard at COVE. Their innovative technologies and forward thinking represent the future of ocean technology in Nova Scotia and beyond. Start-Up Yard is the incubation facility at COVE, helping early stage ocean technology companies commercialize their products and services and succeed in the global marketplace. It offers programs, incubation space and services, funding, shared equipment, expertise and mentoring. Start-Up Yard is more than infrastructure and other resources. It is a community – an environment with a strong innovation culture that lets start-ups engage with like-minded entrepreneurs and organizations that can help them start and grow. It also partners with post-secondary institutions to help drive commercialization of ocean technologies. Start-Up Yard includes open concept desk space, meeting space and shared workshop and testing facilities. Open to all COVE members, it offers prototype design and fabrication equipment and services.
Moderator: Jim Hanlon, CEO, Centre for Ocean Ventures and Entrepreneurship (COVE); Presenters: Iain Stewart; President NRC; Dr. Wendy Watson-Wright, CEO, Oceans Frontier Institute
Traditionally, ocean technology companies have viewed government and academic researchers primarily as customers for their technology products. Academic researchers have viewed their government ocean research colleagues as custodians of the long term strategic research and data management agenda. Academics have view private ocean technology companies as sources of endorsement and matching support for their funding applications. Government ocean researchers have seen academic researchers as very innovative but somewhat tactical and hard to depend on to support long term objectives. Government researchers have mostly been unaware of the capabilities of the Canadian ocean technology industry.
As the ocean changes quickly and as our economic dependence on ocean commerce increases, we need to fundamentally alter these old views and traditional relationships. This session will explore the potential for developing such new relationships from the perspective of Dr. Wendy Watson-Wright who leads the Ocean Frontier Institute, Canada’s largest academic ocean research program and from that of Iain Stewart, the President of the National Research Council of Canada and someone who was instrumental in the early stages of growing the Atlantic Canadian ocean cluster.
The session will be moderated by Jim Hanlon, the CEO of the Centre for Ocean Ventures and Entrepreneurship (COVE). Jim brings the perspective of a long term ocean technology business owner and that of someone who cares deeply about growing Canada’s ocean economy in a sustainable manner.
Introductions: Jeff Stockhausen, Industrial Technology Advisor, Atlantic & Nunavut, Industrial Research Assistance Program, National Research Council Canada
Presenters: Jan Karlsson, Product and Service Development Manager, Secure State Cyber Inc; Justin Gratto, Senior Security Advisor, Secure State Cyber Inc; and Mark Campbell, Chief Architect and Technical Leader, IBM - Atlantic Canada
Ocean Industries face potential threats from cyber-attacks to no less a degree than onshore industries. However, these threats have more often been overlooked when it comes to maritime operations, despite the fact that the security of operational, information and communication networks/technologies and their data are just as critical. To much the same degree, there is also the threat of missing the boat when it comes to new and pervasive technologies that other industries are already embracing, with respect to both the capabilities of Ocean Technologies and their inherent security. In two presentations, by Secure State Cyber Inc. and IBM Canada Ltd., this session will consider maritime cybersecurity awareness in the context of IMO guidance on shipboard risk management and improved security posture in the shipping industry, as well as multiple emerging technologies, including Blockchain, that enhance Trust and Security in the Ocean Sector.
Presenter: Sue Molloy, President, Glas Ocean Electric
Electric boats are an important part of the future of marine, particularly in coastal communities. Dr. Molloy will present the work Glas Ocean Electric (GOE) is doing to drive electrification of small craft. GOE wrote a report for the Nova Scotia Boatbuilders Association on the state of the art of electric and hybrid boats in 2015 and Dr. Molloy will present and update on that report with news from successful electrification projects around the world and the work GOE has been doing with fishers throughout Nova Scotia. GOE has been collecting data on operational profiles of fishing and tourism boats, measuring emissions and working on plans to introduce electric motors to their working operations. Dr. Molloy will outline GOE projects with partners including Nova Scotia Power, Nova Scotia Community College, the Nova Scotia Department of Energy, Transport Canada, PBES and others that both demonstrate and drive electrification.
Presenter: Andrew Lowery, Technical Director, Fundy Ocean Research Center for Energy (FORCE)
The Minas Passage, Nova Scotia has the strongest tidal currents in the world. While attractive for tidal energy development, this extreme environment challenges the limits of standard oceanographic work. In 2012 FORCE established the Fundy Advanced Sensor Technology (FAST) Program to redefine the limits of our capabilities in relation to site characterization, environmental monitoring, and marine operations at tidal energy sites.
Over the last several years, FAST has evolved to include an array of onshore and offshore infrastructure, which have been the basis of innovative research projects that have looked at mooring and station-keeping, turbulence and wake effects, marine sound, fish detection and general marine operations.
Download presentation : Fundy Ocean Research Center for Energy
Moderator: Sheila Paterson, COO, Centre for Ocean Ventures and Entrepreneurship (COVE)
Presenters: Dr. Barbara Cembella, Director of Operations, AviaSpace Bremen, Germany; Kevin Forshaw, Associate Director, Innovation and Enterprise, National Oceanography Centre; Matt Hebb, CEO, Canada’s Ocean Supercluster; Dr Toby Stapleton, Assistant Vice Chancellor and Director, University of Massachusetts Dartmouth’s Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship (CIE); and Lori Woloshyn, Marketing Manager, Innovation Norway
In Atlantic Canada, our ocean technology industry players have always been outward-looking, whether through necessity to access larger markets or to best capture technical opportunities as they arose. Evident is the importance of the strong relationships that have formed among businesses, institutions, governments and other partners. With the announcement of Canada’s Ocean Supercluster as well as an increased focus on ocean innovation internationally, tremendous potential exists to safely and sustainably grow the ocean economy. Representatives from clusters from a number of leading ocean economies—the United Kingdom, Norway, Germany, the United States and Canada—will join to compare approaches, celebrate achievements, relay pitfalls to avoid, and debate best practices and the role of clusters in facilitating connections and technology project development to support industry success.
Presenter: Luis Torgo, Professor, Computer Science, Faculty of Computer Science, Dalhousie University
The ocean is a key ecosystem in our planet and its sustainability is an important objective for policy makers. Given the complexity, dimension and amount of agents intervening on the ocean, data regarding different aspects, state and use of the ocean is a very important asset. Being able to use these data to anticipate the future state of the ocean, particularly deviations from normality, is an important tool to allow for preventive actions to be implemented. Forecasting the future based on past data is the main goal of predictive analytics. In this talk we will present and discuss the challenges imposed by the specificities of ocean data, a few possible solutions, and describe some example projects and applications. In particular, we will describe some past projects related with these topics, and present a few recent initiatives with a strong focus on ocean analytics.
Moderator: Dr. Sherry Scully, Director, Learning & Organizational Development, Institute for Ocean Research Enterprise
This panel discussion will explore how anticipated change in ocean industries will effect workforce requirements and work environments of the near future. We will focus on how technology and social change are changing the workplace; informing skill and competency expectations, and requirements for training and learning. The goal is to develop clear messages about the need to anticipate change in our industry and how our workers contribute in an innovative workplace. This discussion will help to identify priority and high demand skills that will inform recruitment and training strategies.
Moderator: Matthew Johnson, Development Officer, Advocacy and Industrial Benefits, ACOA; Presenters: Alissa Peterson, Co-Founder, SeaAhead; Jim Byrnes, Co-Founder and President, Prometheus Inc; Anthony Baro, Managing Partner, PowerDocks LLC; Mark Smithers, Co-Founder & CTO, Boston Engineering Corporation; and Joe Turner, Co-Founder, Exocetus Autonomous Systems
This session will feature industry leaders from the New England area discussing capabilities in the New England marine technology industry. SeaAhead is a new bluetech innovation center that supports innovation through startup incubation, silo-breaking events, and soon, an associated bluetech sustainability investment vehicle. Prometheus Inc will show examples of why mathematics is the backbone of signal processing. Exocetus presents its MOD2 Glider, a unique underwater vehicle designed for long duration monitoring and sensing on a cost-effective, easy-to-use platform. PowerDocks LLC will discuss powering blue tech and Boston Engineering Corp will showcase tools and modules for maritime technology entrepreneurs.
Read more
Read more
Read more
Read more
Read more
Read more
Read more
Read more
Read more
Read more
Member rates apply to OTCNS members.
Register: $180* (member) | $225* (non-member)
Includes: access to presentations, B2B meetings, industry showcase, lunch and a ticket to the gala dinner.
Students: free — Students must show valid ID; student entry excludes gala dinner.
Booth: $325* (member) | $375* (non-member)
Includes: one ticket to the gala dinner and access to presentations, B2B meetings and lunch for two people. As an exhibitor you may purchase up to two additional gala dinner tickets for $75 each.
All exhibitors receive the following: 6’ x 6’ booth space · Pipe and drape consisting of 8 ft. high back wall, and 3 ft. high side walls · One skirted 4 ft. table · Internet access. Please note power is not provided so please ensure any devices at your exhibit are charged.
Gala Dinner Individual Ticket: $125* (member) | $150* (non-member)
Please note, if you purchase a full conference pass or exhibit booth, one gala dinner ticket is included with your registration.
Gala Dinner Table of 10: $1,250* (member) | $1,500* (non-member)
*All registration fees are subject to 15% Harmonized Sales Tax (HST).
The H2O Conference Partnership Program provides an array of opportunities to organizations and corporations to allow you to select the benefits to best suit your organizational objectives. The H2O conference partnership benefits maximize organizational visibility to your target audience and provide various onsite and online promotional opportunities. As we continue to develop and establish the 2018 conference, cultivating a relationship with partners will be vital to a successful event. Please see our partnership package.
Kevin Forshaw has been engaged with support for the Marine and Maritime sector for over 15 years, acting as the interface between University’s and Research Organisations and Industry. He established a Marine Thematic Group whilst working for the European Commission’s Innovation Relay Centre, and has since worked for three Universities before joining the NOC. During this period he has established numerous collaborative research projects focussed on vessel efficiency, and now increasingly Marine Autonomous Systems, that have leveraged many £millions of supporting EC and UK public funding. Supporting business has also recently been enhanced by the setting up of the Marine Robotics Innovation Centre at NOC, that has attracted many SMEs members, and larger end-user companies as supporting organisations—all working on a portfolio of in excess of £10m of R&D projects to develop the Marine Autonomous Systems of tomorrow.
Kevin also sits on various UK national and regional committees including the Marine Industries Leadership Council, Marine Industries Leadership Group and the Solent LEP’s Solent Marine and Maritime Working Group. His work here is focussed on economic development, and how the NOC and other Research Organisations can assist with the development of high-value marine science businesses that will stimulate job creation and benefit the UK economy.
The NOC is a world-leading Oceanographic Research Centre that undertakes integrated ocean research and technology development from the coast to the deep ocean. Working with our partners we provide long-term marine science capability including; major facilities, sustained ocean observing, mapping and survey, data management and scientific advice.
The H2O Conference will be held at the DoubleTree by Hilton Halifax Dartmouth
DoubleTree by Hilton Halifax Dartmouth offers an ideal location, overlooking the beautiful Halifax Harbour. Just minutes from downtown Halifax, this modern hotel is situated next to the MacDonald Bridge, offering easy access to the ferry terminal, Alderney Landing and the bustling shopping district at Dartmouth Crossing. Business travelers appreciate close proximity to both Halifax and Dartmouth business areas, including Burnside Industrial Park.
Preferred Room Rate for Conference participants:
Per night + tax
Hotel registration deadline: Friday, May 11, 2018
Participants are responsible for booking their own accommodations. Please contact the hotel directly to book your room. Reference H2O Conference to take advantage of the preferred conference rate. If booking online please use the promo code ACA. Rooms will be assigned on a first come first served basis, based on availability. Rooms are available until Friday, May 11, 2018 or until rooms in our limited block sell out.
