The Aegean Ro-Boat Race: A Regatta to Accelerate Innovation in Marine Robotics and Autonomous Vessels

The “Aegean Ro-boat Race” is an international university level competition, challenging teams to design and develop innovative autonomous robotic systems that can perform at sea in real-world conditions. This is an innovation race among universities, but with the support of industry, which merges visionary thinking from different fields to solve problems in marine robotics and autonomous systems. Topics to be judged include autonomous behavior, sensor fusion, object detection, path planning, reliability, and overall innovation. This year's competition took place in Syros, Greece, on 12 July 2023, and consisted of three mission tasks, focused on high speed and performance, collision avoidance, and endurance. This article details what happened during the first “Aegean Ro-boat Race,” presents the results of this unique learning experience, and discusses advances achieved in terms of innovation.