About Float Incorporated

Float Incorporated holds the patents and is developing the Pneumatically Stabilized Platform (PSP) technology for a variety of military and civilian uses.

A Brief History

Having designed the East Terminal at Lindbergh Field, Donald Innis was among the first to tackle San Diego's difficult airport relocation problem. He and the Innis-Tennebaum Architecture firm saw a maritime platform as San Diego's most practical solution and refined this concept for several years until the PSP emerged. In the early 90s Dr. Howard Blood, John Nichelson, and Joseph Leary joined him in his effort, and Float Inc. was formed in 1992. Each brought expertise from different disciplines. Dr. Blood, a physicist had a distinguished career in academia, government and the private sector; Mr. Nichelson's research on large floating platforms was the subject of his masters thesis in Ocean Engineering; and Mr. Leary had combined experience in construction, computer systems design and ocean wave energy conversion.

Shortly thereafter, Dr. Neal A. Brown, Phd MIT, Vice President of Technical Development, a highly respected hydrodynamicist with extensive acoustics experience, joined the team. Neal brought in government contracts from ONR working on high speed ship drag reduction that helped broaden Float's sphere of activity. Additionally, his Naval Architecture background has been very valuable in the development of PSP designs for specific applications. His oil industry contacts will likely result in the construction of the first PSP in the near future. In 2003, he and Joseph Leary filed a patent in the UK for a new wave energy collector design that is still in the incubator.

In February, 2001, Susie Bryant came in as Office Manager. Her expertise is coordination of all aspects of communication with the various worldwide contacts. She also serves as Secretary/Treasurer of the corporation.

In the Spring of 2002, Cliff McMillan, Vice President of Business Development, joined Float. Cliff has extensive experience in large contract negotiation, in nuclear plant construction and large corporate jet sales. But specifically, the "Beyond the Horizon" offshore mega inspection and distribution port system was his idea (See Megaports page).

In January 1993, The Naval Surface Warfare Center, Carderock Division, took an interest in the PSP's potential to serve as a floating military base (See DARPA Contract on the "How it works" page). This interest ultimately resulted in Float being awarded a $1.5 million contract with the Defense Advanced Research Project Agency (DARPA) in August of 1995. Extensive numerical modeling was performed along with two series of wave tank tests. The last of the reports were submitted in early 2000. In a rare case of results exceeding expectations, the PSP demonstrated remarkable wave attenuation and wave load distribution capabilities which will inevitably result in reduced structural requirements and therefore cost.

Numerous potential applications have been proposed since the DARPA contract. But, as Ed Horton has proved with his remarkable SPAR technology and oil industry commercials notwithstanding, new ideas such as floating platform technologies are not readily embraced by those risk averse individuals responsible for financing these expensive construction projects. (See FAQ, "Has it ever been done before?")

This is now finally changing. The attributes of the PSP, its lower cost, and its elegant simplicity have continued to make a compelling case for its use. Several proposed projects are progressing through their development efforts well enough to signal that, barring anything unforeseen, the first project to use the PSP will be built in the near future.