Anahita Laverack was set on becoming an aerospace engineer, but her career took a different turn after a realization at an autonomous robotics challenge. That moment inspired her to launch Oshen, a company that builds fleets of robots to collect ocean data.
In 2021, Laverack, a storied sailor, decided to build and enter a robot in the Microtransat Challenge. This competition tasks participants with sending autonomous sail-powered micro-robots across the Atlantic Ocean. Like everyone else who has attempted this challenge, she was unsuccessful.
She realized the attempts were failing for two main reasons. First, it is inherently difficult to make micro-robots survive on the ocean. Second, and more importantly, they did not have enough real-time data on the ocean to understand weather and water conditions.
Laverack set out for conferences like Oceanology International to find this missing ocean data. She quickly discovered that no one had yet figured out a good way to collect it. Instead, she found people asking if they could pay her to try to collect the data herself. She figured that if people were willing to pay for this data, she could try to build a way to capture it.
Those conversations formed the basis for Oshen, which Laverack founded alongside electrical engineer Ciaran Dowds in April 2022.
The company now builds fleets of autonomous micro-robots called C-Stars. These robots can survive in the ocean for 100 days straight and are deployed in swarms to collect data.
But Oshen started small. Laverack said she and Dowds chose not to pursue venture capital right away. Instead, they combined their savings to buy a 25-foot sailboat, lived at a cheap marina in the United Kingdom, and used the vessel as their testing platform.
For two years, Oshen would iterate on the bots on shore and immediately take them out on the water to test them. Laverack noted that summer testing was manageable, but the robots needed to work in all seasons. Testing during winter storms in a small sailboat led to what she calls some adventurous and interesting events.
Getting the technology right was difficult. It is not as simple as taking an existing larger robot and shrinking it down. The bots needed to be mass-producible and affordable, yet also technologically advanced enough to operate and collect data autonomously for long periods.
Laverack said many other companies have successfully achieved two of those three goals. Oshen’s ability to deliver on all three began to attract customers across defense and government organizations.
The company caught the attention of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration two years ago, but Laverack said their technology was not yet reliable enough for deployment. NOAA reached back out two months before the 2025 hurricane season, after Oshen had successfully tested the robots in U.K. winter storms. This time, Oshen jumped at the chance and quickly built and sent over 15 C-Stars.
Five of these robots were deployed and made their way into position by the U.S. Virgin Islands, where NOAA predicted Hurricane Humberto was headed. Laverack said they expected the bots to collect data only leading up to the storm. Instead, three of the bots weathered the entire Category 5 hurricane, minus a few missing parts, and collected data the whole time. She says this marks the first time an ocean robot has collected data through a Category 5 hurricane.
Now, the company has moved to a hub for marine tech companies in Plymouth, England, and has begun securing contracts with customers including the U.K. government for both weather and defense operations.
Laverack said the company plans to raise venture capital soon to keep up with growing demand.