Aqua Nor 2019 – Scottish supply chain
Ace show for Dundee based innovator
“hasEveryone a huge amount of data and they do so little with it at the moment
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SCOTTISH aquaculture technology innovator Ace Aquatec, well positioned in Hall D by the Gael Force stand, saw visitors from all over the world, said head of sales and marketing Mike Forbes. This was the first Aqua Nor for Forbes and he thought he would just be talking to Norwegians. But by day three, he and his colleagues had seen a truly international mix, from countries including Australia, Japan, Vietnam and Croatia. Mostly, visitors were interested in the BioCam, said Forbes, and the electric Humane Stunner Universal (HSU), which is well known after winning the Innovation Award at the last Aqua Nor. ‘They see it’s proven and see how many installations we’ve got, and videos of it working. They’ve heard about it and had feedback from people.’ But there is growing interest in the new BioCam, too, and Forbes believes it could ‘easily be our biggest product’. The BioCam 3D is an underwater time-of-flight camera that captures fish biomass in real-time. ‘We’ll have ten of them available by the end of this year,’ said Forbes. ‘There are two in the water just now, in the final testing stage [in fact, technically, just one in the water because one was on the stand] at Loch Duart. Dundee based Ace Aquatec also has quite a long waiting list and in the past few weeks the company has initiated a new leasing deal, whereby customers can pay a deposit for a three-month trial. ‘We will be doing these on three-year rental contracts but we’re offering the three-month trials with the first systems,’ Forbes explained. If the customer is happy after three months, they can convert the contract into three years. As for meeting potential demand, Forbes said they can put
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Left: Ace Aquatec head of sales and marketing Mike Forbes
more BioCams in production pretty quickly. ‘We’ve now got the hardware refined but what we’re working on is finalising some of the software side of things. ‘We’re talking to a couple of different artificial intelligence companies about how we can do more using their software. ‘What we always do with everything is go to the people who are experts, in really niche scientific fields. With the BioCam, we went to the experts in time-of-flight imaging and developed the system with them. ‘We’re not software or artificial intelligence experts, or data experts, so we go to people who all they do is software data analysis, who need the hardware to have use for their software. ‘Everyone has a huge amount of data and they do so little with it at the moment, so there’s huge potential there.’ The company continues to expand its overseas markets and Forbes was recently in Australia, where Ace Aquatec sees big potential. ‘We’re already in New Zealand so we know we have the capability to work in that part of the world – we have a couple of stunners there and are building more. We’ve had quite a few enquiries from there and wanted to show our presence.’ Forbes met with salmon farmers in Tasmania, as well as yellowtail farmers and a land based cod producer, Murray Cod Australia, a publically listed company, which produces under the brand Aquna. They have pond systems, which they are in the process of expanding, by the Murray River, and are interested in Ace Aquatec’s stunner and the biomass camera. Ace has also been in discussion with the Norwegian fish handling equipment company MMC First Process, to see how they can integrate a big, 200 tonnes per hour electric stunning system into the processing factories they build on boats. Ace Aquatec stunners – one of which was on display at Aqua Nor- have already been installed on vessels, including on a sea trout boat in Denmark, and one in Greece on board a barge, for sea bass and sea bream. Forbes said winning the Innovation Award in 2017 for the electric stunner was great for building credibility in what the company does. ‘This is the biggest industry event and to be the first non-Norwegian company to win the award was a big honour for us and very prestigious. ‘At the time we won, that product was new and it was very innovative and different, and people didn’t look at it as risky any more after we won. And from that point onwards, we’ve had this as a commercial system and it’s been easy to open doors.’
www.fishfarmer-magazine.com
05/09/2019 09:50:46