Stingray Marine Solutions now has more than 3,500 AI-guided laser submarines patrolling Norwegian salmon pens, according to its latest annual report. The company said they protect over 112 million fish.
The Oslo-based firm added about 1,000 units in the past year. That is growth of roughly 40 percent, from about 2,500 units to more than 3,500. The company said the fleet covers 20-25% of farmed salmon in Norway, and it employs 250 people.
The target is sea lice, tiny parasitic crustaceans that are among the industry's central headaches. Farmers have traditionally leaned on chemical baths, which can treat many fish at once. The downsides, as the source lays them out, are environmental harm, stress on the fish, lice that develop resistance, and the awkwardness of putting toxins into food production.
Stingray's approach swaps the bath for a camera and a beam. The drones use AI to recognize lice, zap them, and work around the clock while the fish swim normally. The company said this avoids chemical use and the resistance problems that come with it. It also claims better growth, welfare and lower mortality, and says fewer cleaner fish (species put in pens to eat lice) were needed where the drones operated. Those are the vendor's own results, and the source gives no independent data.
The limits are practical. Up-front costs may give farm operators pause. The drones only cover the pens they patrol, so lice can gather in darker, murkier corners or outside the patrol area. That makes the system look better suited to keeping local lice numbers low than to clearing a heavy infestation.
The more telling comparison is with the chemical baths. A bath is a one-off intervention across a whole pen, while a drone is a standing patrol. A fleet this size suggests Norwegian farmers see the second model as worth the capital outlay, at least for a fifth or more of the national catch.