A highly-specialized marine surveying company based out of Gothenburg, Sweden, MMT explores the humbling depths of our planet’s oceans.

INTO DEEP

Surveyor Interceptor ROV (SROV) in action.

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PHOTO: THOMAS M

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For MMT, a highly-specialized marine

surveying company based out of Go-

thenburg in Sweden’s shallow Kattegat

Sea, exploring the humbling depths of

our planet’s oceans is just another day

on the job. Founded in 1976 by Swedish

marine biologist Ola Oskarsson, MMT

began as a passion project—Oskarsson

essentially investigating the seas from

his own small skiff. A couple of years

later, Oskarsson developed the first

PC-based positioning software and a

revolutionary navigation software pro-

gram called Aron. Then, in 2003, using

sophisticated sonar, MMT, in partnership

with Deep Sea Productions, located the

legendary DC3 spy plane that had been

shot down and lost during the Cold War.

Four years later, MMT began seabed in-

vestigations for the Nord Stream Project

in the Baltic Sea. The company grew

from 50 to 220 employees by the time

the project wrapped up in 2011.

Oceans. In many ways, they

are mankind’s final frontier.

They cover 70 percent of our

planet, contain 94 percent of

life on earth and are buried

in a complete and perpetual darkness.

It’s no wonder we’ve only explored 5

percent of their vastness. We have more

accurate maps of Mars than we do of our

ocean floors and we put a man on the

moon four full years before discovering

the largest mountain range here on

Earth, lying below the oceans’ surface.

But frontiers produce explorers—men

and women with equal parts courage

and curiosity. Brave souls who go into

the deep, into the darkness to shed light

upon the mysteries of our world.

“ As a mid-sized company, MMT aims to achieve operational consistency with a flexible and solution- orientated attitude, always with great focus on HSSEQ and client needs and re-quirements as top priorities.”

—ELLEN SVESTAD, MMT CHIEF COMMERCIAL OFFICER

Ola Oskarsson, founder MMT,

40 years ago when it all started.

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With extensive and

unenviable experi-

ence searching for

ammunition and

mines in the Baltic

Sea, the most heav-

ily mined waters in the world, MMT also

began capitalizing on the burgeoning

oil and gas industry by offering clients

high-resolution geophysical, geotech-

nical and environmental site surveys,

pipeline route surveys, pre-lay and post-

lay bathymetric data surveys, cathodic

protection services, and pipeline posi-

tion and damage inspections using data

collected via acoustic and visual ROTVs,

ROVs and AUVs. In addition, MMT offers

marine surveys within the offshore wind

energy market and the marine cable

sector and hydrographic surveys in both

large and small scales, providing sea-

bed-mapping services around the world.

“ As part of the risk assessment for submarine installations, MMT will provide detection, verifica-tion, excavation and clearance services for UXO’s as part of our core business, and we are very pleased to be the successful contractor for Dong Energy Wind Power and for Race Bank.”

—ELLEN SVESTAD, MMT CHIEF COMMERCIAL OFFICER

Therese Sundberg, MMTs Geologist Manager, in action.

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What began as a simple curiosity in

the deep unknown has blossomed into

industry leadership. MMT has worked

with some of the market’s biggest

names including Statoil and Dong

Energy, who recently awarded MMT the

contract to carryout pre-lay surveying

for The Race Bank, a proposed 91-turbine

wind farm north of Blakeney Point off

the coast of Norfolk in the North Sea.

“As part of the risk assessment

for submarine installations,” explains

Ellen Svestad, MMT’s recently appointed

Chief Commercial Officer, “MMT will

provide detection, verification,

excavation and clearance services for

UXO’s as part of our core business,

and we are very pleased to be the

successful contractor for Dong Energy

Wind Power and for Race Bank.”

Surveyor Interceptor ROV (SROV).

“ The Interceptor is a very promising addition to our existing service offerings. MMT utilizes a small but effective team for all complex research and development, which can be clearly noted in the one-of-a-kind ROV.” —ELLEN SVESTAD, MMT CHIEF COMMERCIAL OFFICER

PHOTO: JONAS DAHM

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The operating conditions of subsea

structures and pipelines have, for a long

time, been assessed from grainy visual

inspection videos and relatively coarse

multi-beam echo-sounder-point clouds,

where a paltry data density of 5 cm was

considered industry standard. But, by

combining a hydrodynamic-favorable

hull, thin umbilical cables, extreme

propulsion and the latest sensors, MMT,

in collaboration with Reach Subsea,

succeeded in making a Remotely Oper-

ated Vehicle (ROV) capable of delivering

never before seen ultra-high-resolution

data at a substantially lower cost per

kilometer. That vehicle is called the

Surveyor Interceptor. “The Interceptor is

a very promising addition to our existing

service offerings,” Svestad adds. “MMT

utilizes a small but effective team for

all complex research and development,

which can be clearly noted in the

one-of-a-kind ROV.”

To achieve such high image resolu-

tion and accuracy, the Surveyor Intercep-

tor was equipped with an inverted Ultra

Short Base Line positioning system from

Sonardyne in addition to Kongsberg

Hipap transponders to achieve precision

and ensure redundancy. The position-

ing is also supported by two Inertial

To Ellen Svestad, an accom-

plished and driven sales and

marketing leader with over 10

years’ experience gained in

major global organizations,

MMT’s industry success is

largely due to a determined and loyal

workforce. “We are very lucky to have

people working for us with such spe-

cialist competencies who are dedicated

to and enthusiastic about their field of

expertise,” Svestad says. “By focusing

on the knowledge and experience of our

staff, MMT has gained a deeper under-

standing of its core business,” she adds.

“As a mid-sized company,

MMT aims to achieve oper-

ational consistency with a

flexible and solution-ori-

entated attitude, always

with great focus on

HSSEQ and client needs

and requirements as

top priorities.” And

it’s precisely MMT’s

highly specialized

team that has lead

them to some of

the industry’s most

exciting operational

advancements.

Launch of ROTV onboard MMTs survey and ROV vessel Franklin.

“ MMT believes strongly in innovation and we are confident that our skilled team and high level of research and development will result in us achieving stability and growth in the future.” —ELLEN SVESTAD, MMT CHIEF COMMERCIAL OFFICER

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This June, MMT’s radically-

shaped Surveyor Interceptor

vehicle was truly put to the

test when the company was

awarded the contract for the

world’s longest HVDC route

survey by the Atlantic Superconnection

Corporation (ASC). MMT will provide

bathymetric and geophysical mapping

along the entire 1,470 kilometers of the

Interconnector route corridor, between

Iceland and England. The water depth

and seabed conditions vary greatly

along the route with maximum depths

of approximately 1,100 meters.

To many of us, the planet’s oceans

are a mystery. They are incomprehen-

sibly vast, frighteningly powerful and

dangerous to those who challenge them.

But oceans are also inspiring and

majestic, bountiful and essential to our

life here on land. To Ellen Svestad, it’s

not about the water: it’s about the

people. “At MMT, we believe that the

quality of our services, innovation and

technology is only made possible by

our greatest resource: a competent and

experienced team,” Svestad says.

“A reliable, loyal team will help make

MMT’s business sustainable.” ▲

Navigation Systems (INS) and a Doppler

Velocity Log. The Surveyor Interceptor

performs seabed mapping and pipeline

inspection work four to eight times

faster than existing ROVs and the revo-

lutionary umbilical and handling system

yields up to six times better endurance

than Autonomous Underwater Vehicles.

“Being at the forefront of technological

advancements is expensive and time

consuming,” Svestad admits, “however,

MMT believes strongly in innovation and

we are confident that our skilled team

and high level of research and develop-

ment will result in us achieving

stability and growth in the future.”

Surveyor Intercep-tor ROV (SROV) on its first work in the North Sea.

MMT presentations at Offshore Energy, stand 9.006: ”Surveyor Interceptor ROV and UXO surveys” on Tuesday October 13 at 10:00 hrs and 13:00 hrs and Wednesday October 14 at 10:00hrs and 13:00 hrs. MMT’s presentation at the Offshore Energy Conference: Wednesday October 14, Technical Ses-sion, Subsea processing;“3D Visualization of subsea structures” by Ola Oskarsson, Founder and CTO, MMT.

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