Hydrovision

A Brief History

Hydrovision Limited is a Scottish company, based in Aberdeen, which was formed in the mid 1980's by Pressure Products Ltd to develop an ROV around a patented viewport that would allow a camera to tilt and view through 36- degrees. This ROV was named Hyball which neatly describes its shape-spherical; its class-eyeballs; as well as incorporating the manufacturers name.

Chris Tarmey Managing Director & David Grant, Technical Director with Offshore Hyball

The marketing objective was to introduce a high specification vehicle at a competitive price. To achieve this a considerable investment was made in tooling and design so that the manufacturing unit cost could be kept to a minimum. Over £1.2 million was spent on the project and production began in 1989.

With a relatively small home market available for such a specialised product, the company concentrated on exporting by rapidly establishing a network of overseas stocking distributors and agents. By the end of the first year, 23 systems had been delivered to a wide variety of end users including, diving contractors, universities, environmental groups, hydro electric companies, the military and many others. The price and specification of Hyball had brought a professional ROV within the budgets of many who had previously not been able to consider ROV ownership. And over 90% of the production was exported.

Early in 1990 Pressure Products offered Hydrovision to the management. Chris Tarmey led the management buyout, becoming Managing Director and principal shareholder. Assisted and guided by the Scottish Development Agency, who provided further equity funding to become a 25% shareholder, the buy-out was completed on 1st May 1990 with the "new" Hydrovision acquiring the assets, patents and intellectual property rights to Hyball.

Between May 1990 and 1993 Hyball sales continued to grow with the establishment of further overseas distributors, so that by August 1993 the first 100 systems had been delivered to 28 different countries and Hyball had become established as one of the best selling ROVs in its class.

Demon - D Class ROV

During this same period many improvements were made to the system, particularly concentrating on the power distribution. The video circuitry was also improved to match the capability of the modern generation of video cameras capable of providing over 460 lines of resolution at increasingly low light levels. All these improvements were designed and implemented by Dave Grant, who joined the new management team from Osprey Electronics in the position of Technical Director.

Early in 1992 OSEL, the Great Yarmouth based manufacturer, went into receivership. OSEL manufactured a wide range of ROVs, submersibles, deployment systems and winches together with accessories for ROVs. All these products were principally supplied for use in the offshore oil and gas industry. The products which were of particular interest to Hydrovision were the hydraulically powered Rigworker and Seaworker work vehicles and the Super NUFO with its high frequency power supply and brushless DC motors. There was also the potential to support older OSEL products such as the UFO eyeball and Duplus systems still in service around the world.

Funded entirely from new equity provided by Investors in Industry (3I) and additional equity from Scottish Enterprise, Hydrovision acquired the assets and intellectual property rights of OSEL on 17th July 1992. The manufacturing of the OSEL range was moved from Great Yarmouth to Aberdeen.

The OSEL acquisition was an important strategic move for the company and an effective fast track entry for Hydrovision into the offshore gas and oil ROV market. It successfully raised the profile and widened the base of the company's operations. Immediately following this acquisition Hrdrovision won a contract to build their first work class ROV - a MK4 Seaworker for Stolt Comex Seaway.

In the meantime there was concern that, although Hydrovision had stock to support systems, the Rigworker's control electronics were becoming dated. In addition the industry was moving towards increasingly more powerful modular ROVs.

In another fast track move, Hydrovision acquired the intellectual property and manufacturing rights to the Diablo 100 horse power work vehicle from Digilog of Aberdeen, Scotland in 1993. Diablo is a modern, modular hydraulic ROV suitable for construction tasks, with an impressive 3 tonne lift through frame lift. This is calculated at 3G and so is designed for operation up to sea state 6. The control system is PC based and the electronics include a full system diagnostics package.

Principally to give their work ROV's a performance edge, Hydrovision then acquired all rights to an impressive range of hydraulic thrusters named Curvetech. At the request of a number of the major ROV operating companies these thrusters were taken for comparitive trials against the thrusters then fitted to their systems. Results of up to 40% improvement in performance were reported in these independent trials and the Curvetech Thruster was immediately launched as a stand alone product. Today almost every major ROV operating company is using these thrusters.

Based on the immediate success of this product and unreliable deliveries of other hydraulic products for their first Diablo, Hydrovision embarked on the design of a range of Power Packs, valve packs and other building blocks that are uesed in the more po0werful work ROV's. Today the company is as well known for its hydraulic products as the work vehicles themselves.

In 1995 the 100 horse power Demon became the second of the 'D' class work ROV's from Hydrovision. This vehicle uses the same building blocks as the more compact Diablo and has been delivered in various depth ratings to 2000 metres.

Whiole developing the offshore market for their new products Hydrovision have continued to develop Hyball and an alternative version is now available known as the Offshore Hyball. This ROV shares all the patented features of the standard system but incorporates a new power distribution system which provides the Offshore Hyball with 100% more thruster power.

In April 1995 Hydrovision acquired the assets of Merpro Control Systems who manufacture a range of products used in or on ROV systems. These include Bathymetric Systems, Video Switchers, Video Overlay Units, ROV Control Systems, Manipulators, Actuators and Pressure Sensors.

To accommodate all this increased activity Hydrovision moved to a new, purpose built facility at Dyce, adjacent to Aberdeen Airport in August 1995. In the seven years since the first Hyball was delivered the company has expanded from a seven man, one product company to an organisation providing a full range of ROV products, services and systems with three times a many people and five times the turnover.

About Chris Tarmey

Chris Tarmey became Managing Director after successfully negotiating the management buy-out of Hydrovision in May 1990 from Pressure Products Group. He has many years of practical and management experience of underwater operations including 20 years in the Royal Navy and exchange service with the Australian and United States Navies as a Clearance, Saturation and Experimental Diving Officer.

After leaving the Royal Navy in 1987 Chris gained his first experience of commercial life and the offshore diving industry as the Marketing Manager at Gas Services Offshore Ltd, (now Divex). When the production of Hyball started in 1989 he moved with the Group to Hydrovision as Marketing Manager before completing the management buy-out the following year.