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Standards & Testing

BioGlo is engineered to provide reliable rescue visibility, designed for the conditions that make recovery hardest: darkness, spray, fog, chop, and low-contrast daylight.

From concept through production, BioGlo development is anchored to recognized international and U.S. lifesaving standards with conservative performance margins to ensure reliability when it matters most.

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IMO / SOLAS

The International Maritime Organization (IMO) Life-Saving Appliances (LSA) Code under Safety of Life at Sea(SOLAS) establishes baseline requirements for lifejacket lights, including:

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  • Minimum luminous intensity of 0.75 candela (cd) in all directions of the upper hemisphere

  • Minimum operating duration of 8 hours at the required intensity

  • Defined visibility, durability, and reliability expectations for maritime rescue equipmen​t

​U.S.Coast Guard

In the United States, lifesaving equipment for marine use is evaluated under United States Coast Guard (USCG) frameworks, typically through Coast Guard–recognized independent laboratories. These pathways emphasize:

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  • Verified light output and distribution

  • Activation reliability

  • Environmental durability

  • Manufacturing quality controls and traceability

ISO Standards

ISO standards (e.g., ISO 12402 series) provide an internationally recognized framework for PFD design and evaluation, while SOLAS-class ship lifejackets remain governed directly by IMO/SOLAS requirements.

 

BioGlo development is informed by both frameworks, depending on the intended application and market.

The Standards Landscape BioGlo Is Built Around

Performance Targets

BioGlo performance targets are intentionally set to meet or exceed the visibility and duration thresholds used by USCG, SOLAS, and IMO, with additional safety margin where practical.

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  • Luminous intensity: Designed to achieve ≥0.75 cd minimum in the upper hemisphere, consistent with SOLAS/IMO lifejacket light requirements

  • Operating duration: Designed for ≥8 hours of compliant output, with sustained visibility beyond minimum thresholds

  • Brightness at distance: Configurations engineered to deliver clearly detectable illumination up to 1 kilometer, supporting practical rescue detection geometry

  • Activation: Autonomous, non-battery, non-manual activation linked to inflation or water-contact events, supporting unconscious or incapacitated users

  • Visibility geometry: Omnidirectional / wide-angle emission architecture to minimize blind spots and improve detection from surface vessels and aircraft

  • Environmental readiness: Performance targets maintained across marine temperature ranges, humidity, salt exposure, and storage conditions

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Where required by certification pathways, BioGlo testing plans include appropriate measurement methods and conversions between illuminance (lux) and luminous intensity (candela), based on defined geometry and distance.

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BioGlo Testing Program

Optical Output & Visibility Testing
Confirm compliant luminous intensity, angular distribution, and sustained visibility aligned with USCG, SOLAS, and IMO requirements.

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Activation Reliability & Fail-Safe Function

Verify autonomous activation under real-world deployment scenarios, including partial or non-ideal conditions.

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Environmental Durability

Demonstrate resistance to marine environmental stressors such as salt, UV exposure, temperature extremes, and mechanical shock.

 

Shelf-Life & Storage Validation

Ensure long-term storage stability with full functional performance at end of shelf life.

 

Dye-Based Visibility Testing

Validate surface-level visibility enhancement for daytime and aerial detection in applicable product configurations.

Compliance Approach

BioGlo’s commercialization pathway anticipates:

  • Partnering with recognized testing laboratories to support formal approval and certification routes where required

  • Designing systems to meet or exceed established lifesaving visibility benchmarks used by USCG, SOLAS, and IMO

  • Maintaining clear separation between engineering design targets and certified claims, with regulatory statements made only after successful third-party testing and approval

Built to Meet - and Exceed - the Guidelines

BioGlo products are being designed, tested, and manufactured with one objective: to meet or exceed the applicable USCG, SOLAS, and IMO guidelines for marine rescue visibility and reliability.

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That commitment carries through:

  • Engineering: conservative performance targets and redundant activation logic

  • Testing: validation against the same categories regulators and professional operators rely on

  • Manufacturing: controlled processes intended to deliver consistent, repeatable performance at scale

 

In real-world rescue, compliance is the baseline... performance is the difference.

 

BioGlo is built to deliver both.

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