Starboard Maritime Intelligence

Starboard Maritime Intelligence provides a software-as-a-service (SaaS) platform focused on maritime domain awareness for a global clientele. The company was founded in 2019 and spun out from the Xerra Earth Observation Institute in April 2023 to facilitate commercialization and external investment. Spearheaded by CEO Trent Fulcher, whose background includes strategy and innovation roles at Kiwibank and as CEO of AirShare, Airways New Zealand's drone tracking hub, the company targets the complexities of maritime security and environmental protection. Fulcher's experience in commercializing advanced technologies in New Zealand, Europe, and the US aligns with Starboard's mission to scale its platform globally.

The business operates on a subscription model, offering its platform to government agencies, intergovernmental organizations, NGOs, and commercial entities. Its clients utilize the software to tackle critical issues such as illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing, transnational crime, biosecurity threats, and the protection of subsea infrastructure like cables. Early adopters include New Zealand's Customs, MPI, and the Department of Conservation, as well as clients in Australia and the Pacific Islands, like the Marshall Islands Marine Resources Authority. The business aims to disrupt what it sees as a legacy market by enabling easier information sharing between organizations and across borders.

Starboard's platform processes over 4,000 vessel positions per second, integrating multiple satellite data sources, AIS tracking, and machine learning models into a unified interface. This allows analysts to move from days of work to mere minutes, identifying suspicious vessel behaviors such as unauthorized port calls, at-sea transfers, or movements indicative of illegal fishing. The system blends this on-water activity with off-water intelligence, including vessel ownership and licensing data, to create comprehensive risk profiles. A key feature is the ability to analyze up to five years of historical vessel data to establish patterns, alongside real-time monitoring and the detection of "dark vessels" that are not reporting their positions. In April 2024, the company secured NZ$5 million in a seed funding round led by Altered Capital to fuel expansion into North America, Asia, and Europe.

Keywords: maritime intelligence, maritime domain awareness, vessel tracking, illegal fishing detection, SaaS, maritime security, geospatial intelligence, marine protection, vessel monitoring, biosecurity, subsea cable protection, IUU fishing, dark vessel detection, satellite data analysis, maritime surveillance, risk assessment, border security, ocean conservation, fisheries management, transshipment monitoring