"The WASP was developed and built by Graham Hawkes of Offshore Submersibles (OSEL), formerly of the UMEL/DHB consortium in 1978. After successful legal action, Oceaneering prevented OSEL from selling the WASP, alleging that Hawkes had developed the suit while still working for UMEL. Interestingly enough, prior to the legal battle, the contract for the first WASP suit was to Wharton Williams, a firm that later was instrumental in the development of the SPIDER, an ADS strongly resembling the WASP.

The first two WASPs were built and in operation in mid-1978. It is similar in design to the JIM suit, except that below the waist it has a glass reinforced plastic cylinder in place of articulated legs. Small multi-directional thrusters, controlled by foot pedals within the cylinder, gave the WASP more mobility. Although the developers of the JIM suit experimented with a thruster-pack earlier, the WASP was the first suit to successfully apply thrusters, allowing the ADS a mid-water capability not present before.

Oceaneering's WASP has led the field in deepwater repair, setting what is claimed to be a new working water depth record for an on-bottom pipeline repair project. The pipeline repair, completed at 2,150 feet (652m), was made to an eight-inch gas pipeline connecting a well in Mariner Energy's Pluto field to a platform 29 miles away. The job was performed using the WASP and Oceaneering's 150HP Millennium ROV, illustrating the effectiveness of the ADS and ROV in tandem."