About Us

Oceans are the life-support system of our planet. They control our weather, create the air we breathe, and provide much of the food we eat. Yet our oceans remain largely unexplored and misunderstood. This lack of awareness leads to mismanagement of natural resources and limits our ability to predict both local ocean weather and global climate.

Facing our current environmental challenges — from overfishing to coral bleaching, ocean acidification to coastal protection — success ultimately relies on our ability to understand and monitor our oceans. Above all else, we need a rapid increase in ocean data, and to empower more people to use it.

2012 — OpenROV Founded

OpenROV began with a Kickstarter project in 2012. Starting with DIY kits for hobbyists, the company pioneered a revolution in low-cost ROV designs that continues today. They followed up with the original kits with Trident, the first truly accessible underwater drone. In addition to the tools, OpenROV fostered a community of citizen scientists that lives on the forums as well as the Open Explorer expedition site.

2015 — Spoondrift Founded

2018 - Open Explorer sold to National GeographicNational Geographic acquired the Open Explorer digital field journal to build on the momentum of the OpenROV community and expand the capacity of the 130 year old brand to support citizen scientists and explorers around the world.

2019 — Sofar Founded

Finding a common mission and complementary team skill set, Spoondrift and OpenROV merged to for Sofar and accelerate a future with better tools to understand and explore the ocean. The mission of the company is to create pervasive sensor networks to understand and monitor ocean environments and provide critical data for ocean enthusiasts, industry, and conservation.