Marine Innovation at FLIBS: What 2025 Award Nominees Reveal Ahead of 2026
As the marine industry prepares for FLIBS 2026, three nominees from the 2025 Marine Research Hub Innovation & Sustainability Awards offer a timely reminder that meaningful progress rarely comes from one dramatic breakthrough, but from companies willing to question how boats are controlled, powered, built and moved through the water.
Awards are easiest to understand on the day they are presented, when there is a shortlist, a stage, a winner and a moment of recognition, but their real value can often be seen more clearly with the benefit of time, once the excitement of the event has passed and the ideas themselves have had space to develop.
As the marine industry prepares to return to Fort Lauderdale for FLIBS 2026, revisiting three nominees from the 2025 Marine Research Hub Innovation & Sustainability Awards offers something far more useful than nostalgia. It provides a snapshot of the technologies and business ideas that were beginning to challenge conventional thinking only a year ago, while also creating an opportunity to look at what innovation really means when sustainability is treated as part of the engineering problem rather than something added later for marketing purposes.
The fourth annual Marine Research Hub Innovation & Sustainability Awards return in partnership with the Fort Lauderdale International Boat Show this year, recognising companies and organisations working across marine sustainability, environmental conservation, renewable energy, eco-conscious products, social impact and other areas contributing to the development of the Blue Economy.
That makes this an interesting moment to look back at three of the companies recognised among the 2025 nominees, because iHoy Captain, Remigo and Vessev approached the idea of marine innovation from completely different directions. One concentrated on simplifying vessel control and navigation, another reconsidered what an electric outboard could look and feel like, while the third focused on one of boating’s most fundamental challenges, the amount of energy required simply to move a vessel efficiently through water. Together, they demonstrate why marine innovation cannot be reduced to one technology, one category or even one definition of sustainability.
Marine Innovation at FLIBS Can Begin With Simplicity
Innovation is often discussed as though it must involve something entirely unprecedented, but in practice some of the most useful advances begin when someone looks at an existing process and asks whether it really needs to remain as complicated as it has always been. That thinking sits at the centre of iHoy Captain, whose approach to marine autopilot technology is built around accessibility rather than technical intimidation.
The system discussed at FLIBS 2025 was designed to give boat owners access to steering, autopilot, navigation and route-following functions without the extensive drilling, hydraulic work or complicated installation traditionally associated with many marine control systems. Connected through a smartphone, the unit allows users to steer remotely, select headings, navigate routes and work with stored waypoints through the company’s software ecosystem.
The appeal is not simply that another autopilot exists, because autopilot technology itself is not new. What is different is the attempt to reduce the gap between sophisticated marine electronics and the ordinary boat owner who may not want a technician cutting into a vessel, installing hydraulic components or running extensive cabling simply to gain access to those capabilities. That reduction in complexity may appear modest compared with the more dramatic innovations seen elsewhere in the sector, but accessibility is often what determines whether a technology remains interesting in theory or becomes something people are actually willing to adopt.
Remigo Rethinks the Electric Outboard
Remigo approaches the wider challenge of marine sustainability from a completely different direction, focusing not simply on electrification but on whether electric propulsion itself can be made easier to use. Replacing a combustion engine with an electric motor does not automatically make a propulsion system simple, lightweight or convenient, particularly when the transition introduces separate battery boxes, additional cabling and components that create their own practical frustrations.
The RemigoOne discussed during the 2025 awards is a self-contained electric outboard with the battery incorporated into the unit, removing the need for separate external batteries and much of the associated wiring. Its construction is predominantly aluminium, with relatively little plastic, and the product was deliberately designed around a combination of portability, durability and reduced material use. At only 26 pounds, the unit also changes the practical conversation around electric propulsion, because sustainability cannot realistically be judged solely by what comes out of an exhaust or whether a motor uses electricity instead of fuel.
The person standing on the dock still has to lift the motor, install it, store it, transport it and use it, which means that weight, material choice, simplicity and the number of external components all become part of the equation. That is where Remigo’s approach becomes particularly interesting, because the environmental argument is strengthened not simply by removing gasoline from the process, but by designing the product around the idea that electric propulsion should also be easier to live with. The wider marine industry is likely to discover repeatedly over the coming years that environmental benefit alone will not drive adoption if the technology itself introduces new inconvenience.
Vessev Questions the Energy Needed to Move Through Water
If iHoy Captain asks whether marine technology can become easier to access, and Remigo asks whether electric propulsion can become simpler to use, Vessev begins with an even more fundamental question: how much energy should a boat actually need in order to move through the water? Its answer is hydrofoiling, using foils beneath the surface to lift much of the vessel above the water once underway and reduce the drag that normally consumes so much energy.
Josh Trout explained during the 2025 conversation that reducing drag allows smaller batteries to deliver greater useful range, while the foiling configuration can also produce a smoother ride and considerably less wake than a conventional hull travelling at similar speeds. Combined with electric propulsion and lightweight carbon-fibre construction, the design is intended to reduce the energy required to move people across the water while maintaining useful payload and performance, giving the sustainability argument a practical engineering foundation rather than relying on electrification alone.
Perhaps even more interesting is the way Vessev approaches the lifespan of the vessel itself. Battery technology is developing quickly, and designing a boat entirely around today’s technology creates an obvious risk that parts of the system may become outdated long before the hull reaches the end of its useful life. Vessev has therefore designed its vessels with future upgrades in mind, allowing components such as batteries to be changed as technology improves rather than treating the entire platform as disposable. That introduces a broader definition of sustainability, because environmental impact is not confined to what happens while a vessel is running; the ability to maintain, upgrade and extend the useful life of a vessel can be just as important as the emissions it produces during operation.
Innovation Still Has to Answer Difficult Questions
Hydrofoiling also raises questions that deserve proper examination, particularly when part of the vessel is travelling beneath the surface in waters shared with marine life. During the 2025 discussion, the potential impact of foils on animals in the water was addressed directly rather than brushed aside, with the conversation acknowledging that there is no perfect answer and that responsible operation still depends heavily on awareness, speed, location and an understanding of the marine environment.
That willingness to acknowledge complexity matters because new marine technology should not need to pretend that it eliminates every possible environmental impact in order to demonstrate value. Every vessel, propulsion system and operating method involves compromise, and what matters is whether those compromises are understood, whether designers are actively trying to reduce them and whether operators are given the information required to use the technology responsibly. Meaningful innovation should be able to invite scrutiny rather than depend on avoiding it.
Three Different Technologies, One Shared Instinct
There is very little that visually connects an autopilot unit, a lightweight electric outboard and an electric hydrofoil vessel, yet the thinking behind all three is surprisingly similar. Each company looked at an accepted part of boating and questioned whether the existing solution was unnecessarily complicated, inefficient or resource-intensive, then developed a product around the possibility that the answer could be better.
iHoy Captain challenged the assumption that modern vessel control must involve significant installation and technical intervention before a boat owner can use it. Remigo challenged the idea that moving toward electric propulsion should still require awkward battery arrangements, external wiring and the same basic architecture associated with traditional outboards. Vessev challenged the amount of energy required to overcome the drag created when a conventional hull moves through water, then extended that thinking into vessel longevity by considering how future components could be incorporated without replacing the entire boat.
None of those ideas begins with sustainability as a slogan. They begin with engineering, usability and efficiency, and the sustainability benefits emerge because reducing complexity, lowering energy demand, using materials more thoughtfully and extending the useful life of equipment can all influence the environmental footprint of boating over time. That is precisely why programmes such as the Marine Research Hub Innovation & Sustainability Awards matter, because recognition gives emerging technologies visibility while companies are still establishing markets, testing assumptions and demonstrating whether an idea can move beyond an exhibition floor and become genuinely useful within the marine industry.
Looking Back Before FLIBS 2026
The timing of this retrospective is deliberate. The 67th Fort Lauderdale International Boat Show takes place from October 28 to November 1, 2026, bringing the global marine industry back to Fort Lauderdale and once again creating a meeting point for established companies, emerging technologies, investors, manufacturers, boat builders and the people ultimately deciding which ideas are ready to move forward.
Before a new group of companies steps into the spotlight through the 2026 Marine Research Hub Innovation & Sustainability Awards, the nominees from 2025 offer a useful benchmark for what those awards are trying to uncover. They also demonstrate that the Blue Economy is unlikely to be built around one revolutionary solution, but through hundreds of smaller decisions about whether technology can use less energy, require fewer materials, become easier to install, remain useful for longer or reduce the impact created by the way vessels move through the water.
Those questions may ultimately matter more than the trophies, because the awards provide a platform for companies willing to ask them, develop something in response and place those ideas in front of an industry capable of testing, challenging and ultimately adopting them. In 2025, iHoy Captain, Remigo and Vessev were three of those companies, and as FLIBS 2026 approaches, attention now turns to the businesses and technologies that will follow them.
The awards have been supported from the beginning by Allini Water Filters, DeAngelo Marine Exhaust, Total Marine Solutions, Informa Markets and the Marine Industries Association of South Florida, whose continued involvement helps provide a platform where marine innovation and sustainability can receive meaningful industry attention.
The retrospective is not finished either, with three more nominees from 2025 set to be revisited as the countdown to FLIBS 2026 and this year’s Marine Research Hub Innovation & Sustainability Awards continues.
────────────────────────
PRESENTED BY
────────────────────────
The Marine Research Hub of South Florida connects the region’s marine industry, research institutions and wider Blue Economy, creating opportunities for collaboration, innovation and the development of solutions addressing the challenges and opportunities facing our oceans and marine industries.
Comments