Aalto Explorer team members Henri Joona, Andrés Prieto, Manuel Rosales and Oskari Heikkilä. Photo by Annamari Tolonen/Aalto University.

Aalto University has published a fascinating story about Aalto Explorer which continues its underwater adventure through crowdfunding. The aim is to send a remote controlled underwater vehicle to the Baltic Sea in the summer.

Photo: Manuel Rosales/Aalto Explorer

“The vision of Aalto Explorer’s international team of over ten members is to develop a remote controlled and unmanned underwater vehicle, whose underwater journey can be monitored by people all around the world through a network application.“

The team operating in Urban Mill consists of the Aalto Industries company, students from the Aalto University Product Development Project (PdP) course, and other Aalto University students and alumni. The project has received a small amount of initial funding from a private investor, but the development team works mainly on a voluntary basis.

“The majority of the world’s seas have not been explored. Our goal is to allow people to see the beauty of the seas, learn new things and even find lost treasures. At the same time, we would like to draw attention to the state of the seas, says Aalto University master’s student Loi Tran, who is responsible for the project’s business concept.”

“Aalto Explorer originated in 2017 on the Aalto University Product Development Project (PdP) course as a student project, which was sponsored by the company Aalto Industries. A team of students from Aalto University and the Indian School of Design & Innovation built an underwater rover and its interface prototype.”

“The miracle of Otaniemi, inventor Oskari Heikkilä from Aalto Industries describes. I cannot think of another place where you could find a team of over ten experts to work on a voluntary basis aside their studies and jobs in order to create something entirely unprecedented. These people have a lot of courage.”

“The project’s continuation is planned to be financed by a crowdfunding campaign to be launched this summer. The objective is to raise one million euros. Aalto Explorer aims to embark on its journey in the Baltic Sea this year.”

Read the whole story on Aalto University’s web page:

In English: https://www.aalto.fi/news/aalto-explorer-wants-to-make-everyone-an-ocean-explorer

In Finnish: https://www.aalto.fi/fi/uutiset/aalto-explorer-haluaa-tehda-jokaisesta-merten-tutkimusmatkailijan