Jet skiing and sea kayaking has helped George Hutchinson identify a gap in the market for specialised safety equipment. ORCA is a Personal Locator Beacon for water sports usage, which clips to the user’s buoyancy aid ensuring this life saving device is with them at all times when out on the water. The system utilises state of the art location positioning systems, as well as a two-stage activation method to ensure users can be found quickly whilst minimising the chances of a false alarm.

Current PLBs are bulky, unnecessarily complicated, unattractive, heavy and not a single one compatible with buoyancy aids. The ORCA attempts to change this by delivering a high end, attractive, wearable product that people actually want to own.

“One thing that surprised me whilst doing water sports was the lack of specialised or refined safety equipment available. Most of the safety equipment used in these activities is designed for boats and simply carried over and is really not suitable for the application.”

Since graduating Hutchinson has been working as a freelance designer and making bespoke carbon-fibre car parts using a 3d printer.