Vesper Marine has unveiled Cortex, a VHF radio with wireless touchscreen handsets, a built-in Class B SOTDMA smartAIS transponder, and remote vessel monitoring.
“Innovation in AIS technology, touchscreen devices and vessel monitoring has skyrocketed in recent years, but marine VHF hasn’t kept pace and remains an anachronism,” Jeff Robbins, CEO of Vesper Marine, stated in a press release. “Cortex fundamentally changes how you interact with safety communication systems.”
The touchscreen handset is intended to simplify functionality. Touching a vessel’s icon onscreen and pressing “call” makes a direct DSC call to that vessel. Cortex continuously shows crossing situations and navigation light sectors. As many as 10 handsets, either wired or wireless, can be used, and a 10-watt speaker output enables louder audio and alerting.
Cortex includes dual-watch, favorite channels and one-handed operation via a click wheel. Pressing the dedicated man overboard button activates a track back mode on all handsets and marks the MOB waypoint on NMEA 2000-connected multifunction displays.
The smartAIS technology alerts boaters of potentially hazardous situations. It combines navigation sensor data such as wind speed, GPS and AIS information with intelligent alarm management that prioritizes alerts.
Cortex can send alerts about anchor drag, as well as changes to wind speed, wind direction and water depth.
Automatic updates: New features and capabilities are downloaded automatically to the Cortex Onboard App, for updates via WiFi.
For more information, visit: vespermarine.com
