THE COMPANY:
SNTech’s primary goal is to design and build devices to increase the selectivity of commercial fishing practices, making the industry more sustainable. Light, of interest to the fishing gear technology community since the 1970s, can be used as a tool to achieve this. Technologies such as LEDs and cheap manufacturing of hardware and electronics are opening up new commercial opportunities for the wider application of these selectivity devices.
SafetyNet Technologies has been building sophisticated LED systems to enable experimentation into how light can segregate between ages and species of fish, and is applying that knowledge to create simple sets of lights to help fishermen catch the right fish. We work across the sector with fishermen, scientists, suppliers and regulators to create user-centred solutions to issues currently faced by the industry.
We strongly believe that the solutions to humanity’s greatest challenges must be backed by sustainable business cases in order to achieve real impact. To this end, all SafetyNet products aim to satisfy each element of the value chain of which they are a part.
HISTORY
SafetyNet Technologies was originally founded by Dan Watson who was working on a Masters project in Product Design at the University of Glasgow. He became interested in sustainable fishing when he read an article about some Scottish Fishermen arrested in Norwegian waters for throwing fish back into the sea. While the regulations said it was illegal, they lacked the tools to avoid catching the fish in the first place, leaving them in a Catch-22 position.
Over the next few years, Dan worked with fishermen and scientists and created different prototypes to test various theories about light and fish behaviour. Eventually, those prototypes attracted seed funding from the likes of Young’s Seafood, Dyson and Sir Richard Branson and led to the building of a small team to continue the work.
ADVISORY BOARD
We are very grateful for the support from our Advisory Board, which consists of individuals across Industry, Science, Technology, and NGOs.
SCIENTIFIC AND ACADEMIC PARTNERS
AWARDS
PRESS
People are writing about us! Check out some of the articles and videos we’ve been featured in.
In 2017, we ran a crowdfunding campaign to help fund production of our first batch of PISCES and be able to send it to trial partners around the world to use. We raised about £30K.
Thank you to all our supports, a full list can be found here
We work with fishermen to ensure our devices are tailored to their needs