Will O'Brien on Why Underwater Autonomy Demands an NVIDIA 5090
Ulysses CEO Will O'Brien explains how 10 KB/s underwater data links forced him to put an NVIDIA 5090 into an autonomous submarine.
The company building underwater drones for $50,000
Will O'Brien, founder and CEO of Ulysses, sits down with John Collison and Chris Sacca to discuss how autonomous underwater drones can transform maritime operations, from seagrass restoration and offshore wind maintenance to naval defense. They explore the historical innovations of Guinness, the engineering hurdles of high-pressure and low-bandwidth marine environments, and the economic shifts required to vertically integrate and mass-produce underwater robotics at a fraction of legacy military costs.
Key takeaways
- Underwater acoustic telemetry caps out at roughly 10 kilobytes per second over five kilometers, making remote cloud processing physically impossible beneath the surface. Read more →
- In the 1890s, Guinness built an undirected industrial research lab that hired elite scientists without specific assignments, telling them to inspect operations and find problems worth solving. Read more →
- Heavy crewed ships command day-rates in the hundreds of thousands of dollars, worsened by global shipyard backlogs that delay new vessel delivery. Read more →
- Seagrass covers only 2% of the ocean floor but captures 20% of marine carbon, far outperforming coral reefs that take most climate funding. Read more →
- Around 200 undersea fiber optic cables carry virtually all transatlantic telecommunications and global financial transactions. Read more →
- Global factories produce roughly 20 million aerial drones every year, compared to only 1,000 to 2,000 commercial and defense underwater drones. Read more →
6 articles from this episode
Guinness Built an Empire on Hard Science
Will O'Brien explains how Guinness used undirected R&D, the Student's t-test, the widget, and the 7Cs checklist to control quality at scale.
Ulysses Cuts Subsea Drone Costs from $5M to $50,000
Will O'Brien and Chris Sacca explain how Ulysses slashes subsea drone costs from $5M to $50K, turning painful procurement cycles into venture moats.
Seagrass Traps 20% of Ocean Carbon on 2% of the Seafloor
Will O'Brien explains how Ulysses uses autonomous underwater drones for seagrass restoration and why green tape is the biggest barrier.
Undersea Fiber Cables Are Sitting Ducks Without Drones
Chris Sacca and Will O'Brien explain why 200 undersea cables are vulnerable to sabotage and how autonomous drones can patrol ocean choke points.
Why Ulysses Rejects Legacy Maritime Suppliers to Build Millions
Will O'Brien and Chris Sacca explain why scaling underwater robotics requires borrowing from EV supply chains and building factories in-house.
More Cheeky Pint episodes
- How Toto Wolff built the most valuable team in F1Oct 25 · 5 articles
- Muse Wonder: Zuckerberg and Wang's $100B AIOct 18 · 3 articles
- Sea founder and CEO Forrest Li in conversation with Tyler BrysonSep 6 · 5 articles
- Canva cofounder and COO Cliff Obrecht in conversation with John CollisonAug 30 · 6 articles