Vatn Systems Acquires Crewless Marine
Vatn Systems, a defense technology company building autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs) for the US military, allied nations, and commercial customers, announced the acquisition of Crewless Marine, a Rhode Island-based company specializing in advanced underwater acoustic sensing and signal processing.
Founded by former Navy engineers, Crewless Marine brings experience in torpedo acoustic systems, hydrophone manufacturing, and real-time signal processing. The acquisition strengthens Vatn's strategy to vertically integrate its tech stack to control critical technologies, reduce supply chain dependencies, and accelerate development cycles for autonomous systems. Additionally, Crewless is executing on a Navy SBIR for "AI/ML Multi-Sensor/Multi-Target Localization."
As part of the transaction, Crewless Marine co-founder Steve Bordonaro, PhD, will join Vatn as Chief Engineer for Systems, and co-founder Philip Caspers, PhD, will join as Director of Acoustics. Bordonaro brings over 30 years of experience in acoustic signal processing and autonomous systems, including senior leadership roles at the Naval Undersea Warfare Center where he served as Chief Scientist for the Sensors and Sonar Department and led torpedo guidance and control development.
Terms of the acquisition were not disclosed. This announcement comes on the heels of Vatn's $60 million Series A fundraising announcement, and their first international sale to Singapore's Defense Science and Technology Agency (DSTA), where the company is supporting the enhancement of Singapore's national defense with scalable, next-generation underwater capabilities.