Remote operation centers (ROCs) will significantly enhance and revolutionize the offshore industry. By moving offshore functions from onboard to onshore facilities, we can achieve greater cost-efficiency and sustainability. This shift not only reduces costs but also enhances safety and efficiency through the use of autonomous and remote operations technology. Combining remote operations with increased automation will help prevent significant accidents, as safety barriers and risk mitigation measures will be strengthened. As one of the few highly operated 24/7 ROC centers, Remota will provide a detailed description of the business model behind this innovative approach.

2025 marked a milestone in Massterly's operations, when the first mandatory role was moved from the vessels and into the remote operations center. Since February, three vessels have been run with the ETO and chief engineer on shore, and only the bridge crew remaining onboard. What are the experiences? What is the engineer's situational awareness? Join us for some insight into remote operations, from an operator's perspective.

The navigation data of today is primarily designed to support human decision-making to conduct navigation planning and execution. To support increasing autonomy within the navigation domain, data needs to be machine readable and machine intelligible. While much of the content of the core navigational products, such as the electronic navigation chart (ENC), are machine readable, there is a wealth of ancillary information, which contains important information to support situational awareness, that may prove much more challenging for an autonomous system to assimilate. The presentation will explore some of the challenges and potential solutions for data producers and developers of autonomous navigation systems.

This presentation will share advancements from early adopters who are harnessing the detection capabilities of W-band radar. It will present case studies where this technology is combined with multisensor modalities to enhance situational awareness of collision avoidance and DP systems, exploring the importance of reliable and robust detection in all conditions to ensure the safety of uncrewed systems.

This presentation will discuss a recently secured project to integrate multiple data, vessel and mission profiles into the Robosys Voyager AI autonomous navigation (ANS) software. It will review the past 20 years of software and algorithm development and maritime autonomy projects and the last 12 months of integrating new datasets and developing new AI/ML algorithms for autonomous short- and long-path planning for smart shipping applications.

The MEGURI2040 Fully Autonomous Ship Project, administrated by the Nippon Foundation, has moved to the second stage, targeting the commercialization of fully autonomous ships in 2025. Under MEGURI2040 Stage 2, the consortium of over 50 companies (DFFAS+) in Japan has been developing a fully autonomous navigation system equivalent to Level 4 but also working on other activities necessary for the social implementation of MASS. The presentation shows the project's progress, especially focusing on how the consortium works on the social acceptance of stakeholders in the whole system of interest ranging from shipowners and operators to seafarers and users of MASS.

Shifting from land to waterborne transportation will help to preserve nature and can reduce noise, congestion, accidents and pollution. European short sea shipping and inland waterways transportation face challenges like declining crew availability and non-optimal logistics. The Horizon EU project Seamless aims to accelerate efficient unmanned operations for these segments with advancements in ship autonomy, remote control centers, cargo handling, docking, port management,and booking systems. Sintef Ocean will present plans for two full-scale demonstrations of the developed technology on the Horten-Moss and Lille-Antwerp-Duisburg loop services, scheduled for summer 2026.

An outline description of the I-MASTER (Italian Maritime Autonomous Surface Ship Test Range) project will be provided. Phase 1 of the project (design) has been successfully carried out and Phase 2 (implementation) is undergoing. The full entry into service of the infrastructure is scheduled for the end of 2027. The idea of I-MASTER is to realize the proper system of ecosystems (comms, logical, infrastructural) able to test MASS>2 surface platforms, the related technologies (shore-based and off-shore) and software (and AI) procedures/tools needed for undertaking autonomous navigation with large cooperative ship models.

The maritime industry is undergoing a transformative era, driven by technological advancements, environmental regulations and the push toward sustainability. This presentation explores the latest trends and challenges and the critical need for a cybersecure environment in marine engineering. The presentation will cover emerging trends in marine engineering, challenges facing the industry, compliance with stringent regulations, the need for a cybersecure marine environment and the future outlook. The objective is to provide an in-depth understanding of how the marine engineering sector is evolving and highlight the importance of a robust cybersecurity framework to protect its technological advancements.

Cyber threats and electronic interference can sink projects before they even set sail. What are the key cybersecurity risks and vulnerabilities, and how can they be mitigated? The presentation offers three real-world cases where Mahi detected, resolved and reported security flaws in communication devices and navigation sensors. These findings highlight the critical need for secure-by-design navigation systems to ensure continuous and reliable operations in uncrewed and lean-crewed vessels. The Baltic Sea jamming crisis and rising geopolitical tensions reveal further vulnerabilities in autonomous systems. The presentation outlines mitigation strategies to counter jamming-induced paralysis, spoofing-driven navigation errors and direct cyber intrusions.

With the reduced availability of GNSS due to spoofing and jamming and the limitations of lidar-based methods in open sea environments, inertial navigation presents a clear alternative for the reliable navigation of autonomous surface vessels. During extended GNSS outages, velocity aiding becomes essential to achieve survey-grade accuracy. This aiding can be provided by acoustic instruments based on the Doppler principle, offering accurate measurements of speed over ground, as well as measurements of speed through water and current. When integrated with a high-end INS, this solution provides a dependable alternative in situations where GNSS cannot be relied upon.