We’re building autonomous ships for the U.S. Navy and commercial customers. Our team has launched 100+ hardware products, built some of America’s most complex ships, and fielded millions of robots. Some of these are in use in your home, others on Ukraine’s battlefields. We don’t doubt that building ships with no human crew will be tough. We like tough.
External link for Blue Water Autonomy
Boston, MA, US
What's a Software-Defined Ship? Read on to find out
Highly recommended reading from Artem Sherbinin and Austin Gray in War on the Rocks about software defined warships. As USS PINCKNEY (DDG 91) pilots new technology for the fleet, the importance of good software is a weekly topic. Great work. https://lnkd.in/gUsfjPkF
Our CEO Rylan Hamilton went on Bloomberg to talk #shipbuilding. Check out Rylan's 4-minute interview here to learn about our supplier base + our plans to produce many cheap, unmanned ships to complement the US Navy's crewed fleet. ... and guess where we're going to assemble the ships?
Blue Water Autonomy co-founders Rylan Hamilton and Austin Gray headline our first LAUNCH DAY episode -- now live!
🚀 Today, we are proud to announce $14M in seed funding, reveal our world-class team, and share our vision for the future of maritime autonomy. Our founders Rylan Scott and Austin have led and scaled robotics companies from kitchen table to exit, have developed hardware products from concept to factory floor, and have spent years at sea from ship engines rooms to naval combat watchfloors. Our team is built of, by, and for true builders. And our team is growing. ⚓️ Our mission - build an autonomous ship that can deliver capability the Navy has long sought - is not an easy one. But it is a mission that we embrace at a moment when democracy itself needs naval power. Long the anchor of global trade and the backstop of American diplomacy, the U.S. Navy's supremacy is under threat. 🇺🇸 The U.S. Navy needs autonomous ships - ships Blue Water Autonomy will deliver. Since launching last year, we have secured funding from incredible investors Seth of Eclipse, Stephen of Riot Ventures and Jack of Impatient Ventures. With this funding, we have developed the tech, team, and relationships that today allow us to emerge from stealth and accelerate. Damn the torpedoes. Full steam ahead. #shipbuilding #defense #defensetech #ukraine #russia #china #taiwan #defensetechnology #pentagon #dod #nationalsecurity #technology #drones #autonomous #autonomoussystems #UAV #UGV #USV #UUV #UxV #manufacturing #industrialpolicy #industry #production #readiness #congress #venturecapital #vc #exits #firstbreakfast #resilience
Blue Water Autonomy reposted this
🤔 Trying to digest yesterday's flurry of policy on shipbuilding & defense reform? I'll break down the impact on: 1️⃣ Government Funding Lines 2️⃣ Shipbuilders 3️⃣ Defense Contracts 4️⃣ Maritime Autonomy Tech Innovators 🚨 These 3 executive orders - signed by POTUS yesterday - could re-draw the map, catalyze the bureaucracy, and foreshadow bigger change to come. EO 1: Modernizing defense acquisition 🛡️ EO 2: Restoring U.S. maritime dominance ⚓ EO 3: Reforming foreign military sales 🌍 The vibes in these executive orders are fantastic, but what do they actually do for businesses? First, let's look at the new money. 1️⃣ The EOs direct DoD, Commerce, DoT, etc to use, and ease the use of, existing funds from: ✅ Defense Production Act Title III (industrial base funding) ✅ Office of Strategic Capital loans (DoD-backed capital for dual-use tech) ✅ Maritime Security Trust Fund (proposed dedicated budget) ✅ Shipbuilding Financial Incentives Program (grants, loans, and loan guarantees) ✅ Expanded or reformed existing programs (Title XI, Small Shipyard Grants, FMS) ✅ Foreign investment incentives via trade policy and zone designations ✅ Legislative proposals for new scholarship and workforce funding ✅ Regulatory reforms to unlock faster access to appropriated funds Only the Maritime Security Trust Fund would be a new pot of money. This EO is catalyzing proposals that will need legislative buy-in to unlock new money... and telling DoD and DoT officials how to spend money they already have. 2️⃣ For Shipbuilders - From Neglected to National Priority - New federal loan, grant, and tax incentives - Streamlined vessel acquisition and fewer regulatory roadblocks (🔥HUGE) - Long-term demand forecasting - A "Buy American" push and stronger cargo preference enforcement 🛡️ For Defense Contractors: Get leaner, fast, and bold - Faster procurement: OTAs and Adaptive Acquisition - Delegate & accelerate acquisition - Underperforming MDAPs could actually get cancelled (🔥HUGE) - FMS overhaul to improve competitiveness 🤖 For New Tech Firms & Unmanned Innovators - time to build - Programs will prioritize speed, iteration, and commercial solutions - Unmanned vessel programs are specifically targeted for growth --> compete with incumbents - Streamlined contracting pathways & fewer requirements Could there soon be a national maritime opportunity zone for uncrewed maritime tech? Where would it be? We'll need to watch the reports that come out of this executive action. But if you're building, leading, or investing in this space... the message is clear 🇺🇸 #defensetech #defense #attritable #survivable #expendable #ukraine #russia #china #taiwan #defensetechnology #pentagon #dod #nationalsecurity #technology #drones #autonomous #autonomoussystems #UAV #UGV #USV #UUV #UxV #shipbuilding #manufacturing #industrialpolicy #industry #production #readiness #regulation #congress #venturecapital #vc #exits #firstbreakfast #resilience
Time to build - in New England!
The Northeast: a leader in defense and industrial tech? You better believe it. Last week the Northeast showed its prowess in defense and industrialism with back-to-back epic events. In Boston, the annual MIT/HBS Technology & National Security Conference. Humbled to share the stage and talk about REGENT with such accomplished NatSec founders from Shield AI, Vannevar Labs, Nominal. In New York, Deep Tech week with 8090 Industries Heavy Industrials day. Hundreds of attendees who were all in on manufacturing and building the US industrial base with talks from Atomic Industries, Exowatt, and Durin. The movement is real and the Northeast is building.
This is the way
⚓️ Shipbuilding Crisis 🤝 Meet Unmanned Ships At a moment of need, US Shipbuilding is a cluster💥f... BUT new tech can help bend the curve. 🏁 🚩This post will get granular on how unmanned ship designs are part of the solution. First, far better minds (e.g. Ian & Brent) are working on the big picture of changing supply & demand incentives in the US market for ships. I'm only building one ship that can light the way and help on the supply side. Second, the problem statement, framed by Tuesday's US Senate hearing: "Although the Navy has seen a near doubling of its shipbuilding budget over the past 2 decades... consistent failure to increase its ship count" (Shelby Oakley GAO) This statement applies outside Navy - more money chasing diminishing output. 5️⃣ Reasons Unmanned Shipbuilding answers the call: 🔨 Manufacturing Labor: Less complex designs mean less wiring, plumbing, and welding inside a ship. This specialized labor = the #1 cost driver in shipbuilding! Example ➡️ A ship without humans doesn't need hatches (doors). Creating a hatch in a sheet of steel takes several hours of welding to cut the hole, fit in the new hatch, weld and bolt in supports and then add rubber fittings, to make sure the hatch is watertight. It takes more labor. The sheet of steel without the hatch is stronger, lighter, and cheaper than with the hatch. ⛓️💥 Specialized Components: The #2 driver of cost and the #1 driver of schedule slippage! Big ships only have one or two suppliers for their engines, propellers, drive shafts, etc - GLOBALLY!! There is almost no competition in this space. Unmanned ships - let's assume they're 100-200 feet - have much broader supply chains. Example ➡️ Where big ships rely on bespoke parts with 18-36 month lead times, small ships can use power, electronic, and battery components from the much larger electric vehicle & truck industry. ⚙️ Commoditized Components & Material: Unmanned ships are simply smaller. They don't need as much steel, as many electronics, as many sensors. Example ➡️ Check out my USNI Proceedings piece on ship tonnage driving cost 🌏 US vs Foreign Supply Chain: Asian and European companies are much better at big ship speciality hardware. Example ➡️ Hyundai (South Korean), ABB (Swiss), and Wartsilla (Finland) are some of the best at supplying drive train components for big ships. Cummins, Caterpillar, and Thrustmaster (Indiana and Texas) have what you need for a smaller ship. Ships without crew are... smaller. 💪 Crew and Operations Labor: Once you build the ship, it's much more expensive to operate a crewed vessel. Example ➡️ Go read John Ʌ Konrad V's X feed. I'll RT a few of his best. At the end of the day, we need some simpler ship designs that American yards with slack can build. Unmanned ships offer the simplest ocean-going form factor, and can be built with commercial supply chains. The software is much harder... but America is good at software. Let's be good at #shipbuilding too 🇺🇸 🇺🇸
Blue Water Autonomy reposted this
Sat down with Matt Slusher at CSIS to talk drones. 🌏🎙️ We hammered TWO key takeaways at the intersection of today’s tech and tonight’s battlefield. 1️⃣ Defining attritable. It’s about matchups with your adversary, risk, production cost, and supply chains. 2️⃣ Speed. Wise generals & admirals emphasize the importance of fast OODA loops. It’s time they put the same emphasis on capability development OODA loops. We must build-test-learn-iterate every single day - or our capability will be garbage. Thanks to CSIS for hosting such a great discussion series. I drafted a summary of the great Battle Lab Black Sea discussion as well, and much of my writing codifies the takeaways we fleshed out live. Some more detailed content linked in first comment ⤵️ #defensetech #defense #attritable #survivable #expendable #ukraine #russia #china #taiwan #defensetechnology #pentagon #dod #nationalsecurity #technology #drones #autonomous #autonomoussystems #UAV #UGV #USV #UUV #UxV #shipbuilding #manufacturing #industrialpolicy #industry #production #readiness #regulation #congress #venturecapital #vc #exits #firstbreakfast #resilience
STARTING NOW: Colonel Matthew Slusher, CSIS Defense and Security Department U.S. Air Force fellow, sits down with Austin Gray, former U.S. Navy Intelligence Officer and co-founder of Blue Water Autonomy, and Major General Gregory Gagnon, Deputy Chief of Space Operations for Intelligence for the U.S. Space Force, to discuss the impact of autonomous vehicles in warfare and the role of space in modern conflict. Watch: https://cs.is/4kGQhwf
🔥 Our co-founder Austin sat down with Matt and CSIS Defense and Security Department to talk drones Dive in below
STARTING NOW: Colonel Matthew Slusher, CSIS Defense and Security Department U.S. Air Force fellow, sits down with Austin Gray, former U.S. Navy Intelligence Officer and co-founder of Blue Water Autonomy, and Major General Gregory Gagnon, Deputy Chief of Space Operations for Intelligence for the U.S. Space Force, to discuss the impact of autonomous vehicles in warfare and the role of space in modern conflict. Watch: https://cs.is/4kGQhwf
Blue Water Autonomy reposted this
Thank you to The Economist for covering my work on OTAs and defense reform!! 📚😎 Last week's special report nailed the tricky situation the Pentagon finds itself in. At a moment of existential risk for the post-WW2 order, America's politicians want strength and dynamism from a military-industrial machine wedded to cold war processes and tech. Some key takeaways from the piece: 1️⃣ Palantir is CRUSHING 2️⃣ Some big companies are asleep at the wheel. (Case and point... today on Zoom, I witnessed a large company person effectively tell 50 industry peers that his company had solved maritime autonomy...) 3️⃣ DIU mafia and others are hacking their way into the system, carving a path for tech in the Pentagon 4️⃣ Money won't solve all the Pentagon's problems - we need reform 5️⃣ But many incumbents and bureaucrats don't understand the sense of urgency 6️⃣ Musk & Hegseth, with Trump's blessing, may flip the table on the status quo in the defense industry 7️⃣ The optimal mix of forces - legacy platforms vs new tech - is a hot topic. I wrote back to The Economist (check this week's letters) to argue one additional point: if we work out defense acquisition reform, and make this a competitive market, the market will solve for the best tech, best product, and whatever the warfighter needs. I can tell you first hand, from working in a Ukrainian factory where we produced both legacy armored vehicles and new drones: once there is combat, there is no longer debate about what tech works and what we need. ⏩ ⏩ ⏩ I also wrote to them to say - please - support the FORGED Act, Senator Wicker's defense acquisition reform shaped by Eric Lofgren and many others. Key leaders of our defense tech movement Michael A. Brown Shyam Sankar Michael Waltz Raj S. Christopher Kirchhoff Aditi Kumar Ylli Bajraktari Michael Horowitz Kathleen Hicks contributed to Shashank Joshi's piece, and I never expected to see my name up there with them. 🇺🇸 #defensetech #defense #attritable #survivable #expendable #ukraine #russia #china #taiwan #defensetechnology #pentagon #dod #nationalsecurity #technology #drones #autonomous #autonomoussystems #UAV #UGV #USV #UUV #UxV #shipbuilding #manufacturing #industrialpolicy #industry #production #readiness #regulation #congress #venturecapital #vc #exits #firstbreakfast #resilience