Marine propulsion start-up takes transatlantic leap

Sealence DeepSpeed North America Corp, a US legal entity wholly controlled by Sealence group, is based in California, specifically in the area west of Los Angeles known as ‘Silicon Beach’.

Silicon Beach is an area notoriously characterised by a strong concentration of innovative technological start-ups, but also by the proximity to innovation and industrial clusters of the highest profile ranging from electric mobility to artificial intelligence and aerospace.

Sealence is taking on the marine propulsion market with DeepSpeed, a sort of electric jetdrive that mounts outside the hull. The company holds multiple patents. Perhaps due to the company’s IP concerns there is not a great deal of information available about how DeepSpeed actually works and how it achieves the company’s claim to be ‘the most efficient naval propulsion system that has ever been imagined’. Looking at the imagery on their website though, we would imagine that one of the advantages over a traditional jet drive would be that the water flow is not forced to change direction through the scoop grate and elbow of a traditional arrangement.

One of the advantages of electric propulsion is that the outer casing of an electric motor can be built into a propeller nozzle, thus allowing the use of a more efficient hubless propeller/ impeller, although we can only guess that this is what DeepSpeed is doing.

Despite Sealence referring to DeepSpeed as a jet (and it looking rather like an aircraft’s jet), it appears to have much more in common with shrouded propeller systems, such as Voith’s Linear Jet (also not really a jet). After all, the whole point of a traditional Jet drive is it scoops water from below the waterline and propels it out level with or above the waterline. It is the physical mass of the water getting ejected backwards that drives the boat forwards with a traditional jet, and DeepSpeed, being entirely underwater cannot be doing this in quite the same way.

“After the outstanding level of attention and interest obtained at CES 2022 in Las Vegas, we decided to speed up our internationalization plan” – says CEO William Gobbo – “We are sure that California, and in particular the Silicon Beach area, is the perfect location for us. Visiting potential office locations in the area I could clearly see an environment that is thriving with new technological and business ideas and where we will be neighbours to the most promising start-ups in the world of green technology and sustainable innovation”

“Of course,” – continues William – “it’s also no coincidence that from the windows of our Californian offices we will enjoy the view of the Pacific Ocean. It will certainly be a great source of inspiration and energy for all our employees, as well as a habitat perfectly in line with our vocation which is at the same time very maritime, highly technological and environmentally friendly.”

The company’s internationalisation plan, which was announced last year, plans another two foreign offices, in China and Australia/New Zealand, consistent with its patent strategy.