In an era where artificial intelligence is reshaping industries from healthcare to finance, a French startup is bringing technology to the high seas.

Amphitrite is leveraging AI to optimize maritime shipping routes and assist in ocean cleanup efforts, offering a glimpse into the future of environmentally conscious navigation.

The company, founded by a team of expert oceanographers, is harnessing satellite data and AI models to predict ocean currents and weather patterns with unprecedented accuracy.

Amphitrite’s technology, powered by NVIDIA’s AI and Earth-2 platforms, allows vessels to reduce fuel consumption, cut travel times and lower carbon emissions.

“We’re at a turning point in the modernization of oceanic atmospheric forecasting,” said Alexandre Stegner, Amphitrite’s co-founder and CEO, in a statement. “There’s a wide portfolio of applications for our AI models, but our primary focus is on supporting the energy transition and addressing environmental challenges.”

A Smarter Way to Sail

Traditional weather forecasting for maritime operations has long relied on numerical modeling and computational fluid dynamics.

However, these methods face limitations when applied to ocean currents, which often involve complex, nonlinear physics. Observational data for the ocean also lags behind that of atmospheric weather systems.

Amphitrite’s approach departs from conventional models by employing fine-tuned AI techniques to analyze individual parameters, such as currents within the first ten meters of the ocean surface.

These insights, which have demonstrated twice the accuracy of traditional methods, help ships adjust their routes in real-time, avoiding extreme weather while maximizing the benefits of natural oceanic flow.

The company’s AI models are trained on vast datasets from NASA and the European Space Agency’s Sentinel-3 satellite, among others. Amphitrite is also the first organization to integrate data from the Surface Water and Ocean Topography mission — a joint initiative involving NASA, the French space agency CNES, the Canadian Space Agency, and the UK Space Agency.

“SWOT provides an unprecedented resolution of the ocean surface,” said Evangelos Moschos, Amphitrite’s co-founder and chief technology officer. “Only with NVIDIA’s accelerated computing can we analyze the entire ocean at optimal performance and efficiency.”

Reducing Carbon Emissions

As global shipping companies work to curb their environmental impact, Amphitrite’s technology has emerged as a vital tool in their sustainability efforts.

A case study along the Mediterranean Sea found that the company’s fine-scale routing solution helped a shipping firm reduce carbon emissions by 10 percent.

Several major maritime and oceanographic companies — including CMA CGM, Genavir, Louis Dreyfus Armateurs, and Orange Marine — have adopted Amphitrite’s AI models to refine their operations.

The startup is also collaborating with a non-governmental organization to track and remove pollution from the Pacific Ocean, using AI to trace plastic waste drifting from a garbage patch off the California coast.

Through its partnership with NVIDIA Inception, a program supporting cutting-edge startups, Amphitrite has gained technical assistance, cloud computing resources, and access to advanced simulation tools such as NVIDIA’s FourCastNet model.

As the maritime sector continues to embrace AI-driven solutions, Amphitrite’s work signals a shift toward a future where technology improves efficiency and plays a pivotal role in preserving the health of the world’s oceans.