TidalX's origins are somewhat special: it originated from a moonshot project at Alphabet's X Development lab, later spinning out into a company specializing in underwater computer vision and aquaculture robots. Recognizing fish in murky seawater is inherently one of the hardest problems in computer vision.
Features and application scenarios
The system consists of autonomously moving robotic cameras and precise sensors that can cruise inside net pens to collect data, outputting real-time biomass estimation, sea-lice detection, fish-welfare monitoring, and supporting automated feeding. The whole platform is built on Google Cloud infrastructure, emphasizing enterprise-grade data-processing capability. The company has bases in both Milpitas, California, USA and Bergen, Norway, and its main customers are commercial farmers of Atlantic salmon.
Suited to the operations and sustainability departments of medium-to-large salmon-farming groups. For Taiwanese readers, TidalX is more like a technology weathervane: Alphabet's willingness to pour moonshot-lab resources into fish farming shows that datafying food production is seen as a long-term big topic. If Taiwan's aquaculture wants to move in this direction, what's usually lacking is not sensors but the patience to continuously accumulate data for over three years.
Main features
- Autonomously moving underwater robotic camera
- Real-time biomass estimation
- Sea-lice detection and counting
- Fish-welfare and behavior monitoring
- Automated feeding control
Common uses
- Biomass and health monitoring of offshore net pens
- Sea-lice management and regulatory reporting
- Automated feeding and feed efficiency
- Data evidence for sustainability metrics
Key Features
- Autonomously moving underwater robotic camera
- Real-time biomass estimation
- Sea-lice detection and counting
- Fish-welfare and behavior monitoring
- Automated feeding control
Pros
- Deep underwater-computer-vision expertise, from Alphabet X's research accumulation
- Robots can move and cruise, with coverage better than fixed cameras
- Built on Google Cloud, so data-scale processing is no problem
Cons
- Aimed at large commercial farming; small farms are not the target customer
- Pricing and adoption details must be requested
- Main validated species is Atlantic salmon
Use Cases
- Biomass and health monitoring of offshore net pens
- Sea-lice management and regulatory reporting
- Automated feeding and feed efficiency
- Data evidence for sustainability metrics
Editor's Note
Alphabet's moonshot lab ultimately choosing to land its tech in fish farming is itself worth pondering for Taiwan's tech and agriculture circles.
FAQ
Is TidalX still related to Google?
TidalX originated from Alphabet's X Development lab and then spun out to operate independently; the platform is still built on Google Cloud. In practice you deal with an independent company, not buy a service from Google.
What's the advantage of a mobile robot over a fixed camera?
A fixed camera can only see a small part of the net pen, with large sampling bias; a mobile robot can cruise the whole pen for more representative samples. The trade-off is that hardware complexity and maintenance cost go up too.