Seatrec Awarded $30.8 Million in Department of War APFIT Funding to Accelerate Persistent Undersea Monitoring Capabilities
Seatrec Awarded $30.8 Million in Department of War APFIT Funding to Accelerate Persistent Undersea Monitoring Capabilities
Selection Underscores the Joint Warfighting Capability Need for Operational Deployment of Seatrec’s Persistent Subsea Autonomous Profiler
San Diego, California — July 21, 2026 — Seatrec, a leader in thermal-powered, long-endurance subsea drones, today announced that it was selected by the Department of War (DoW) to receive a $30.8 Million award under the Accelerate the Procurement and Fielding of Innovative Technologies (APFIT) program. The award will fast-track the production and scaling of Seatrec’s Persistent Subsea Autonomous Profiler (PSAP), an attritable subsea platform delivering persistent undersea domain awareness capability to U.S. forces.
"This APFIT award is an important step in our mission of bringing the Navy persistent 24/7 undersea information, covering areas that are presently largely unmonitored,” said Dr. Yi Chao, CEO and Founder of Seatrec. “With this APFIT support, we’re delivering PSAP systems immediately to warfighters to meet their requirements and fill critical gaps in maritime domain awareness.”
The PSAP is based on Seatrec’s commercial product - the infiniTE™ float. PSAP is the first subsea drone powered by the energy harvested from temperature gradients in the ocean. Power-demanding sensors, such as passive acoustic hydrophones for soundscape monitoring and active acoustic echosounders for seafloor mapping, can now be integrated on the PSAP platform with essentially unlimited endurance. PSAP systems are attritable and can be deployed at scale.
After a successful pilot demonstration in collaboration with the Naval Postgraduate School (NPS), the PSAP earned support from the Commander, Naval Meteorology and Oceanography Command (CNMOC). This APFIT award will allow Seatrec to deliver PSAP systems with the required sensors and payloads to warfighters as early as the last quarter of 2026.
“Accelerating innovative technologies that support our persistent undersea situational awareness—and delivering them into the hands of warfighters quickly—enhances the joint force’s ability to ensure our national security,” explained Dr. Jason McKenna, the Chief Technology Officer at CNMOC. “The ability to quickly transition groundbreaking technology like Seatrec’s PSAP to scalable production shows the impact of the APFIT program.”
The APFIT program, established in Fiscal Year 2022 by Congress within the Office of the Under Secretary of War for Research & Engineering (OUSW(R&E)), is designed to transition mature, mission-ready technologies that fill joint warfighting capability gaps into production and fielding at scale.
The APFIT award allows Seatrec to immediately begin low-rate initial production (LRIP) of PSAPs in Seatrec’s existing California facility. Additionally, Seatrec plans to expand capacity with a full-rate production (FRP) facility in Mississippi to meet the Department’s future demand.
"PSAP is a good example of what we're trying to build across the Department: get a validated prototype through experimentation fast, then hand it to a program like APFIT that can scale it into the fleet without losing years to the old requirements process," said Dr. An (Mike) Tran, Director of Prototyping, Office of the Deputy Assistant Secretary of War for Prototyping and Experimentation within the Office of the Under Secretary of War for Research and Engineering.”
"This is exactly what our Prototyping and Experimentation mission is built to do,” Dr Tran said. “And exactly the kind of company the Department's Mission Engineering Integration Activity (MEIA) work is built to find: a small, innovative business with a real capability. We rely on industry like Seatrec to bring us solutions we would not generate ourselves, and we leverage our Tier 1 (Technology Validation) events like Technology Readiness Experimentations (T-REX) to pressure-test them with the Services before we ever ask for production dollars. PSAP earned its way to APFIT. That is the model we want more small businesses to follow."
The APFIT 26-2 awardees and program updates are posted on the Department of War’s news releases website. APFIT program details are available on the Department of War’s APFIT website.
ABOUT SEATREC
Seatrec designs and manufactures subsea drones that generate electricity from ocean temperature gradients. Our products empower defense and oceanographic researchers to extend mission durations, optimize data collection, and reduce operational costs.
Seatrec’s energy-harvesting core technology was developed at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory and spun out of the California Institute of Technology in 2016. Seatrec is headquartered in Vista, California. Visit us at seatrec.com.
Media Contact
Marta Bulaich
Seatrec, Inc.
marta.bulaich@seatrec.com
+1 (415) 816-1665
Seatrec’s infiniTE™ Float Surpasses 1,000 Dives for Naval Postgraduate School
Seatrec’s infiniTE™ Float Surpasses 1,000 Dives for Naval Postgraduate School - Ushering a New Era of Long-Endurance Persistent Ocean Monitoring
Autonomous profiling float delivers oceanographic and acoustic data every six hours, fully powered by harvested energy from temperature gradients, marking a breakthrough in persistent, long-endurance ocean monitoring and real-time reporting for defense, scientific research, and exploration
Seatrec, a leader in thermal-powered subsea drones, today announced a major milestone in oceanographic research with the 1,000th dive completed by its infiniTE™ float, deployed off the coast of Kona, Hawai’i, in collaboration with the Naval Postgraduate School (NPS). The float reached depths of 700 meters, diving into the deep sound channel for optimal listening, while producing more electricity than it consumed. The first-of-its-kind, an ocean-powered float carries a passive acoustic hydrophone, records sound data, processes data onboard, and transmits information and intelligence in real-time.
“Reaching 1,000 profiles is a critical endurance benchmark for our technology that unlocks exciting opportunities in ocean research and exploration,” explained Yi Chao, Ph.D., CEO and founder of Seatrec. “It is a significant achievement to demonstrate the capabilities of our infiniTE™ float to power multiple sensors with the energy from the ocean rather than relying on a limited battery.”
Launched on November 5, 2024, in collaboration with the NPS and funded by NPS’s Consortium for Robotics and Unmanned Systems Education and Research (CRUSER) program, this pioneering float known as the Persistent Smart Acoustic Profiler (PSAP) has harvested over 10 megajoules (2,800 Wh) of clean, renewable energy using Seatrec’s patented infiniTE™ technology, which converts natural ocean temperature gradients into electricity. Over just seven months, the infiniTE™ float has generated 2x the energy of a conventional battery-powered float while maintaining a net-positive energy balance. The harvested energy powers a Conductivity-Temperature-Depth (CTD) sensor and a passive acoustic hydrophone, onboard data processing, and satellite data transmissions, ushering in a new era of long-endurance, persistent ocean float missions.
NPS’s mission is to deliver defense-focused graduate education and interdisciplinary research to enhance the Navy’s operational effectiveness and technological leadership. “Through the Meteorology and Oceanography (METOC) program, NPS drives impactful results via innovative research and technology co-development. Our METOC student, Lieutenant Kirk Bienvenu, is analyzing PSAP data in his master’s thesis to advance maritime intelligence. By collaborating with startups like Seatrec, NPS equips officers with skills to address complex global threats, ensuring Navy readiness in dynamic operational theaters,” said John Joseph, the principal investigator and faculty associate for research at the Naval Postgraduate School.
PSAP represents an innovative way to collect and transmit oceanographic and underwater acoustic information essential to supporting critical Navy mission areas, including Undersea Warfare, Seabed Warfare, ISR and Maritime Domain Awareness. “Operating independently of other theater assets, PSAP provides a real-time feed of critical information directly to the warfighter, enhancing their tactical decision making,” Joseph said.
By combining a CTD sensor with a hydrophone, the infiniTE™ float enables simultaneous monitoring of both the ocean’s physical properties and acoustic soundscape. This breakthrough marks a turning point for persistent long-endurance, multi-sensor ocean observing missions once limited by battery constraints.
This milestone adds to a series of recent achievements by Seatrec, including:
- Selection by Sea-Bird Scientific as the exclusive manufacturer of the Navis floats for the international Argo program.
- A successful Arctic Power Station test at Michigan Tech’s Great Lakes facility.
- Recognition as a winner of the U.S. Department of Energy’s Powering the Blue Economy™: Power at Sea Prize.
As the infiniTE™ float continues to demonstrate unmatched endurance and modularity, Seatrec is accelerating its vision to deliver scalable, self-powered solutions for defense, researchers, government agencies, and industry partners operating across the world’s oceans.
About Seatrec
Seatrec designs and manufactures subsea drones that generate electricity from ocean temperature gradients. Our products empower defense and oceanographic researchers to extend mission durations, optimize data collection, and reduce operational costs. By enabling the integration of advanced sensors previously limited in endurance and functionality, such as hydrophones, we open new possibilities for ocean science. Seatrec’s energy harvesting core technology was developed at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory and spun out of the California Institute of Technology in 2016. Seatrec is headquartered in Vista, California. Visit us at seatrec.com.
About the Naval Postgraduate School
The Naval Postgraduate School is a defense-focused graduate university offering master’s and doctoral degrees in fields of study core to Naval-unique needs, the U.S. Armed Forces, DOD civilians and international partners. For information, visit: nps.edu.
Media Contact
Marta Bulaich
Seatrec, Inc.
marta.bulaich@seatrec.com
+1 (415) 816-1665