I’ve seen that design a few times too from Boxfish Research and RJE Oceanbotics so its not a new design.
Boxfish Research:
RJE Oceanbotics SRV-8:
M2:
Its an interesting frame design for sure! I think the only downside is that it isn’t inherently stable, so the gyro and control system really has to be spot on. The M2 configuration appears to be more similar to the Boxfish frame with the thruster arrangement. The thrusters are opposite on the SRV-8, I don’t think it matters.
As for the thrust question, one of us would have to do some vectored thrust calculations, but I think it would be equivalent to the standard 4-thruster vectored configuration.
I’d be interested to see if anyone makes up a custom frame design based on ArduSub!