Gold partner · 2027 season

Mobula× ScoutDI

ScoutDI is Mobula's first partner. A Trondheim drone company, backing a student-built submarine that carries its own drone.

Lidar point cloud of the Mobula team and ScoutDI waving at ScoutDI's office in Trondheim, shown as orange points on blackThe Mobula team waving in front of ScoutDI banners at ScoutDI's office in Trondheim, one of them holding a ScoutDI drone
The Mobula team with ScoutDI at their office in Trondheim, 1 October 2026, as the lidar recorded it. Switch to the camera for the same moment.

Who ScoutDI are

Drones that go where people should not have to.

A Trondheim company with roots at NTNU. ScoutDI builds drones that inspect the inside of tanks, mines and other enclosed spaces where there is no GPS, so that people do not have to go in themselves.

It is so inspiring to see the control ScoutDI achieves with their drones and the precision of their lidar scans. That is exactly why we are so happy to have them as a partner.

The Mobula team
Visit scoutdi.com ↗

The partnership

What it is, in three lines.

  • 01

    Hardware for the build

    ScoutDI supports Mobula with lidars and drone hardware. It goes straight into building the vessel, on the two sides of the project that are closest to their own work.

  • 02

    Gold partner for 2027

    As a Gold partner, ScoutDI goes prominently on the hull and the team apparel, is named in press and competition material, and gets a demo day where we bring the vessel and the drone to their office.

  • 03

    From NTNU, backing NTNU

    ScoutDI started at NTNU. It means a lot to the team that a company with those roots is now backing a new group of NTNU students building something of their own.

On the vessel

The two parts of Mobula closest to what ScoutDI does.

ScoutDI's work is drones and lidar. On Mobula those are the drone that lives in the hull, and the two lidars that navigate on the surface.

Side render of Mobula with the drone bay hatch open, one lidar dome at the tip of the bow and a second on the aft rim of the bay, both picked out in blue
Lidar

Two lidars, nowhere near each other

One sits in the fairing at the tip of the bow, the other on the aft rim of the drone bay. Both are picked out in blue in this render; on the vessel they are black.

The vessel
Render of Mobula on the surface with the bay hatch raised and the quadcopter airborne just off the deck
Drone

Built into the boat, not carried by it

The aircraft lives in a hatched bay amidships, launches off the deck, and comes back to a marked pad inside the hull. It is the vessel's eyes and its radio relay.

The drone

The visit

Every photo here exists twice.

On 1 October 2026 the team visited ScoutDI in Trondheim to celebrate the partnership. We scanned the room with a lidar while the photos were taken, so each moment exists once as a picture and once as a point cloud.

Colour in the scans is distance from the sensor, and the room is grey. Nothing else was added: every dot is a point the lidar measured, and the scans that move are its own frames, played back at the speed it recorded them.

Dense lidar point cloud of Mobula team members standing around a table, in orange and yellow tones on blackMobula team members gathered around a laptop and a table of black boxes at ScoutDI's office
Around the table at ScoutDI, as points and as a photo.

Thank you, ScoutDI.

We can't wait to show you what we build.

Visit scoutdi.com ↗See the vessel Become a partner too