Nelson camera and artificial intelligence firm SnapIT has purchased Canadian fisheries monitoring firm Teem Fish, in hopes it will win a large tender for the deployment of cameras to the neo inshore fishing fleet. -Zeeland.

According to the Ministry of Primary Industries (MPI), inshore vessels fish near shore, where fishing poses a significant risk to protected species.

SnapIT chief executive Chris Rodley said the project would be the world’s largest deployment of cameras to a fishing fleet and would be closely monitored by the industry.

MPI planned to install cameras on 345 vessels by 2024. The information collected by the cameras would support fisheries management and fishing compliance more broadly, a spokesperson said in March.

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SnapIT offers GPS tracking, satellite communication, on-board video cameras and AI-based data storage.

He is able to identify the species, type and size of fish and has already been involved in a number of trials with MPI for deployment, but these had not involved AI.

The purchase of Teem Fish kicked off a long-term strategy to acquire global fishing companies with a strong local customer base for the company.

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Teem Fish had strong ties to the fishing industry and a federal designation, allowing it to provide surveillance data on federally regulated fisheries, Rodley said.

SnapIT had supplied most of the hardware and software to Teem Fish for its surveillance systems since its inception two years ago.

The rapprochement of the two companies would allow them to provide greater assurance that the fisheries are managed in an environmentally sustainable manner, Rodley said.

“If the story we tell is that we are the best managed fishery in the world and we prove it through transparency, we can demand a premium. We need it given the size of our fishing exports.

Rodley did not disclose the purchase price but said it was “a significant acquisition”. It was nice to have “the rising tide in the other direction” and see a Kiwi company buy out a foreign company, he said.

SnapIT had raised capital for the transaction and was in the process of raising more for its next acquisition, he said.

“We are trying to create a group of companies which makes it obvious to MPI [to choose us]. “

MPI expected the on-board camera surveillance to reduce bycatch of fish that were not intended for capture.

SnapIT had offices in Great Britain, Canada and the United States, as well as in Nelson.