The FAVOR project launched on 1 June 2026 with £1.2m of Horizon Europe funding, led by Liverpool John Moores University (LJMU), to recommend a unified regulatory architecture for autonomous ships1. Horizon Europe is the EU's research framework programme. FAVOR's remit spans regulation, risk assessment, cybersecurity, human factors, education and training, sustainability, and the transition of the maritime workforce, the strands a vessel rulebook leaves unresolved.
FAVOR sits one layer up from the operational route the MCA opened for UK trials. Where that route lets vessels into the water now, FAVOR addresses the cross-border architecture that does not yet exist: a single coherent framework rather than a patchwork of national regimes. Both descend from the IMO MASS Code, which set a baseline but left the harder questions of liability, workforce and harmonisation to be filled in by others.
Labour leads that list of unfilled questions. The seafarers' union Nautilus International argued at the IMO that a master should remain aboard whenever any crew are present, contesting the empty-bridge model the Code permits. The dispute pits an industry case for removing crew against a union case for keeping command on board, and FAVOR's workforce-transition strand is the forum where an independent academic team examines it rather than a vendor with hardware to sell.
