Saildrone Inc.

Saildrone Inc., headquartered in Alameda, California, operates as a prime contractor delivering wind and solar-powered autonomous unmanned surface vehicles (USVs) and associated maritime data collection services to federal agencies. The company is a for-profit organization that competes predominantly in full-and-open procurements without relying on SBA set-aside designations, though some task orders are awarded under small business set-asides where the agency initiates them.

Saildrone's core capability is the design, deployment, and operation of uncrewed surface vessels equipped with advanced oceanographic, meteorological, and sensor packages for high-resolution maritime data collection across diverse ocean environments. Recent representative work includes a $10 million firm fixed-price delivery order awarded April 13, 2026, by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) under the ProTech 2.0 Fisheries Domain for Southern Ocean data collection supporting fisheries research; a $30.1 million Other Transaction Agreement with the Office of Naval Research awarded August 29, 2024, for demonstration of USV capability to execute essential Navy missions; a $54.1 million production-focused Other Transaction Agreement with the Office of the Secretary of Defense awarded September 22, 2022, for Voyager Drones production; and a $15.6 million BPA call from the U.S. Coast Guard awarded March 17, 2026, for continuous maritime domain awareness in the Northeast and Great Lakes districts. The company also received a $3.82 million delivery order from NOAA's Office of Marine and Aviation Operations in October 2025 for uncrewed maritime systems supporting meteorological and oceanographic observations, and a $7.31 million delivery order from NOAA in October 2025 for hurricane observation missions in Key Biscayne, Florida.

Customer concentration is dominated by NOAA, which accounts for 43 awards representing $11.08 billion in combined potential value—approximately 98% of Saildrone's total federal pipeline. The U.S. Coast Guard ranks a distant second with 8 awards valued at $66.4 million, followed by the Office of the Secretary of Defense ($57.7 million across 2 awards), the Department of the Navy ($76.9 million across 3 awards including ONR and Secretary of Navy), and the U.S. Geological Survey ($1.1 million across 4 awards). NOAA's dominance across both award count and dollar value reflects the agency's sustained investment in autonomous maritime platforms for oceanographic research, fisheries surveys, hurricane observations, and bathymetric mapping.

Saildrone holds multiple parent vehicles anchoring its federal footprint. The NOAA ProTech 2.0 Fisheries Domain—an $8 billion multiple-award indefinite delivery contract awarded March 29, 2024, and set aside for small business—is the largest vehicle by ceiling and generates the most task-order activity, with 16 delivery orders carrying $9.9 million in combined potential value. The company also holds a $37 million single-award BPA with the U.S. Coast Guard (awarded August 11, 2025, running through August 10, 2028) for maritime domain awareness services; a Department of the Navy Other Transaction IDV worth $46.4 million awarded September 8, 2025, focused on C4F (Command, Control, Communications, and Computers Fires) integration; a $9.6 million single-award BPA with NOAA under the GSA Multiple Award Schedule for uncrewed surface vehicle in situ data services (June 1, 2023 through May 31, 2025); and a GSA Multiple Award Schedule contract (Federal Supply Schedule 47QTCA22D0097, awarded June 7, 2022) offering unmanned surface vehicles and mission services on a multi-agency basis, with pricing ranging from $2,670 per day for maritime domain awareness operations to $8,393 per day for bathymetry surveys. Three NOAA indefinite delivery contracts worth $7.5 million each (each awarded September 1, 2023, with completion August 31, 2026) cover ocean exploration and characterization, living marine resource surveys, and meteorological and oceanographic observations.

Activity has remained relatively flat, with 9 awards in 2022, 10 in 2023, 5 in 2024, 6 in 2025, and 3 in 2026 year-to-date; the decline from 2023 to 2024–2026 reflects a shift toward larger-value task orders issued against standing IDVs and BPAs rather than new prime awards. Nine awards with ultimate completion dates in the next twenty-four months carry combined potential value of $66 million, presenting recompete exposure for platforms currently under task orders issued against the Coast Guard BPA, NOAA IDVs, and GSA Schedule vehicles.

Saildrone operates exclusively as a prime contractor—66 of 66 awards in the source are prime awards, with no subcontractor footprint. SCI-reported invoiced revenue on federal service contracts above the $150,000 threshold totaled $13.1 million across FY2022–FY2024 ($3.1 million in FY2022, $3.6 million in FY2023, $6.5 million in FY2024), with federal FTE levels at 0.0 FTEs in FY2022, 0.5 FTEs in FY2023, and 4.1 FTEs in FY2024 on contracts captured in SCI. Government-paid hourly rates on SCI-reportable prime contracts ranged widely, with median rates around $561 per hour and senior labor pricing through $3,803 per hour, reflecting the mix of platform operations, mission planning, and technical data services. SCI represents only federal service contracts; it excludes the larger product-delivery and equipment-procurement component of Saildrone's revenue from vehicle manufacturing and deployment.

1. SAILDRONE INC. is a full-service, ocean and atmospheric data service provider and operator of proprietary, innovative and cost-efficient unmanned, autonomous maritime surface vehicles (USVs or Saildrones). These USVs have an integrated suite of environmental and Maritime Domain Awareness (MDA) and Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance (ISR) sensors, for the specific purpose of collecting high-resolution atmospheric, surface and sub-surface ocean data and then generating respective data products for a variety of customers and missions. Saildrones are unmanned surface vehicles (USV) engineered for oceanographic research and offshore data collection and powered by wind and solar energy.