RanMarine Technology

RanMarine Technology is a Rotterdam-based autonomous surface vessel (ASV) company founded in 2016 by Richard Hardiman. The company designs, develops, and deploys industrial autonomous aquadrones for waterway cleanup and environmental monitoring, operating at the intersection of marine robotics and sustainability. Its flagship product, the WasteShark, is a catamaran-form autonomous surface vessel that vacuums floating plastic debris, biomass, and organic waste from harbors, marinas, canals, and industrial waterways.

WasteShark can collect up to 350 kg of trash per run and clear up to 500 kg per day, with a 10-hour runtime, 5 km operational range, and zero direct carbon emissions using electric propulsion. The WasteShark+ Pro variant adds 4G connectivity, LiDAR-based collision avoidance, and pre-mapped autonomous cleaning routes. Beyond the WasteShark, RanMarine offers the MegaShark — a heavy-duty vessel for large-scale port and river operations — and the CyanoShark, which targets harmful cyanobacteria (blue-green algal blooms) in lakes and reservoirs.

All vessels can be equipped with water quality sensor payloads measuring pH, dissolved oxygen, temperature, depth, and blue-green algae concentration in real time. Data is aggregated through the RanMarine Connect portal, which transforms the aquadrones into networked IoT devices providing environmental heatmaps and actionable analytics. RanMarine has received funding through the European Commission Horizon 2020 SME Instrument programme and is listed on a public market under the ticker RAN.

The company has deployed its vessels in ports and waterways across Europe, the Middle East, and beyond. Its technology addresses a key environmental challenge — waterway plastic and algae pollution — using autonomous robotics rather than manual labor, and its data platform enables proactive water quality management for port operators, municipalities, and industrial facilities. Note: prior tags assigning this company to Healthcare and Senior Care are incorrect; the correct application domain is Inspection and Maintenance and environmental remediation.