The future of maritime autonomy is being built in America. Ahead of next week's #Sail250 New Orleans events hosted by the New American Industrial Alliance, including a tour of Conrad Shipyard, we're excited to share a preview of Blue Water's Liberty Class MUSV (Medium Unmanned Surface Vessel). With a proven steel @damen Axe Bow, and strong shipyard momentum behind us, our hull is quickly taking shape at Conrad. See you on the water.

🤔 How do you build a Navy ship like a tech product? Wrong question. 🚀 🇺🇸 Last night, the Navy released a new MUSV solicitation and totally flipped the script. Here’s my take: ⚓ The Ship ✅ The Qualification 🏁 The New Competition ⚓ What ship do they want? - Threshold objectives are low. For example, a minimum speed of 12.5 knots is half the previous MUSV speed requirement of 25 knots - Objective requirements still give teams points for solving hard warfighting problems (like EMCON autonomous navigation)  - Navy is asking for an “F-150 of the open ocean” rather than a Jaguar or a very specific design  - Containerized payloads are still all the rage ✅ How to qualify?  - New competition largely does away with “surrogate” test vessels  - You need to build the ship you’re proposing, and demonstrate it shortly after proposing  - You could demonstrate on a slightly different variant, but not a totally different vessel  - The core tech on the test vessel = core tech on the production vessel  - The paper proposal = ship specs, a short paper, and a video - Show > Tell  - Some will gripe that these gates favor incumbents. This is not inaccurate, but too narrow. They favor teams that invest in the product. 🏁 How is this competition different? The above may sound very logical, but it’s a far cry from old NAVSEA acquisition models. It’s also very different than MASC or MUSV in many ways: - Companies are not being told to build to very specific specs. They have latitude to design and offer a differentiated product - There is no contract award guaranteed, only a spot in the marketplace. If you offer a great product the fleet wants, that pull will win the day - You are not winning this competition based on the minutiae of a 100 page paper proposal, a 20 person capture team, and 5 stage red team review process. - You win by demonstrating the product. ⚓ Previously, people like me were talking a big game about how to build warships like tech products. Now, the Navy is showing it’s ready to buy autonomous ships like commercial tech products. 🤝 🏗️ Buying shapes the market. The market shapes the tech. The builders deliver. *For context, I have gotten a few texts from reporters and industry friends asking for thoughts and it’s easier to put this out. I’m also going to industry day with PAE RAS this afternoon, and don’t like posting after an industry day, where senior leaders often speak off record / on Chatham House rules. Candid dialogue at industry day is healthy. The above is all sourced to publicly available documents on the internet, before industry day.

This week, we showed off something special when the @FutureNavyComm visited Conrad Shipyard. Liberty's 220 foot hull design unlocks speeds up to 27 knots and long-endurance, fully autonomous operations. But what makes her different goes beyond the hull. From modular engine rooms and electric propulsion to navigation autonomy and A-CHENG, our autonomous chief engineer, we’ve re-architected the ship from the inside out to operate without a crew onboard. That same diesel-electric architecture provides the power and flexibility to support demanding payloads, including directed energy systems, while a large working deck can accommodate up to six 40-foot containers. We’re proud to be building the first Liberty Class with Conrad Shipyard, and excited to see her taking shape. Meeting with the Commission, including representatives from NAVSEA, PMS 300, and SUPSHIP, catalyzed discussion not just about what we’re building, but about how autonomous vessels fit into the future fleet. Want to see what’s under the hood? Explore the technology powering Liberty and our approach to autonomous ships: blw.ai/technology

Is it a boat? Is it a plane? It’s… a Viceroy Seaglider! You never quite know what you’ll encounter on daily sea trials, and this week our Atlantic Endurance team, or rather, our perception suite, spotted our friends at @regentcraft putting their Viceroy through its paces in Narragansett Bay. What's the coolest tech you've spotted out on the water?

Electrical power is becoming combat power. Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Daryl Caudle released C-NOte #10 on directed energy and addressed the Directed Energy Symposium yesterday in National Harbor, Maryland. “For too long, we have viewed directed energy as an emerging technology rather than an operational capability. That must change,” Caudle wrote. MORE: navytimes.com/news/your-navy…

🇺🇸⚓️ ADM Caudle explains that 1) lasers are the weapons he most needs on ships today and 2) lasers are ready - but ships are not. 🤔The Problem: Most Navy ships are mechanical drive and have very little spare electricity. They use a 200-300 kW generator to power the ship's electrical grid. Lasers today need 200-300 kW and will need 1 MW soon. If you've been underway with @USNavy you'll know how finicky the power is on ships 💡The Solution: Build a high-power-electric fleet. Powered by conventional diesel or gas, or nuclear for the largest vessels, a single electric grid powers the whole ship - both propulsion AND weapons. Navy has been uncomfortable with diesel-electric, gas-electric, and nuke-electric - but we need to get over it. The future is electric. Commercial industry in the U.S. is already there on ferries and tug boats. We can move up the complexity curve and build 10-50 MW warships that are easier to maintain AND fulfil the CNO's vision. As CNO points out, this also solves our toughest air-defense cost-curve problem. Read @USNavyCNO in @washingtonpost with my favorite OpEd of the year: "The issue is not whether a laser can destroy a target during a controlled demonstration. It can. The issue is whether a warship can repeatedly generate and sustain the power required for the laser while simultaneously powering propulsion, radar, communications, electronic warfare and the other systems required to fight another ship. That makes directed energy as much a ship-design challenge as a weapons challenge. A ship’s electrical power will increasingly become a measure of its combat power. Future ships with greater electrical capacity will be better able to integrate advanced sensors, directed energy weapons, electronic warfare systems and tactical computing. Ships without sufficient reserve electrical power and cooling capacity will struggle to accommodate future combat systems as power and cooling become as consequential to combat effectiveness as ammunition, speed, range and payload."

The Atlantic Endurance is officially the first U.S. offshore service vessel operating under Subchapter L to receive U.S. Coast Guard approval for autonomous testing. Blue Water has worked alongside Rhode Island Fast Ferry to integrate our full navigation autonomy stack aboard its 82-foot CTV, Atlantic Endurance. Powered by @NVIDIARobotics Jetson AGX Orin, the system integrates five cameras, two radars, an INS, a full compute cluster, and navigation autonomy developed in partnership with MarineAI. This summer has put our team and our technology to the test. We’ve fine-tuned navigation for smooth, predictable rides and taught the system to distinguish non-vessel radar targets. Yes, that includes you, e-foiler. 😎 Autonomous testing means Blue Water is achieving milestones every week. Constant testing, development, and improvement is the reality of the broader effort to operationalize autonomous systems on the blue water. There is no substitute for putting autonomy on the water. Testing against real marine traffic, weather, and edge cases five days a week teaches us what no simulation can. Stay tuned. #NVIDIAforstartups

This Yacht model was made with the axe bow,instead of sailing up or over waves like the traditional flared bow, it was designed to slice through it 🤯. The axe model makes it easier to move your Yacht and reduces the slamming and shaking inside the Yacht when heavy waves come around

Two U.S. Senators, a Congressman, and leaders from across #RhodeIsland joined us in Quonset yesterday to see the future of maritime autonomy firsthand. We were proud to welcome Senators @SenJackReed and @SenWhitehouse, Congressman @gabeamo, and leaders from Rhode Island’s maritime, business, and innovation community to tour our Unmanned Operations Center and see our autonomous technology aboard the Atlantic Endurance, owned and operated by Rhode Island Fast Ferry. The visit came just days after Atlantic Endurance became the first U.S. offshore service vessel operating under Subchapter L to receive U.S. Coast Guard approval for autonomous testing. We’re grateful to our team, partners, and the Rhode Island community helping us move maritime autonomy from vision to reality. And we’re only getting started. Watch the video below for a look inside the event and our technology in action. 🎥 piped.video/eAWuDWZa9kU?si=QDM_…

🇺🇸Blue Water and @USCG achieve an autonomy first! We're using a crew transfer vessel in full autonomous mode to test unmanned navigation, obstacle avoidance, and compliance with maritime rules of the road. To celebrate, we hosted our Rhode Island delegation in Quonset, RI yesterday to show them the test vessel - the first OSV that the Coast Guard has authorized for such autonomous testing. @SenWhitehouse @gabeamo @BlueWaterShips @QuonsetRI

Only one MUSV design can power directed energy. Why not all?

🇺🇸 👷‍♂️ One of the most important podcasts of the year - takes you INSIDE America's most important shipyards in the deep south. On the ground facts at these yards expose some key points of tension in America's industrial base revitalization narrative: - America is not bad at shipbuilding. American commercial yards are producing exquisite ships - ships that are slow and expensive to build. - "It was incredible to see the level of quality in some of these yards." @samlagrone compared U.S. yards, who are building ships like hand-made NASCARs to foreign yards building Kia Optimas - Small shipyards offer enormous opportunity and capacity - capacity Navy struggles to tap because of inconsistent requirements, acquisition, and employment strategy - "There is a lot of capacity at these smaller yards" @MalShelbourne - BUT - approaches to small shipyard capacity differ greatly. - Conrad Shipyard has a five-yard machine that churns out dozens of ships per year, and takes efficient and high quality barge building techniques straight to MUSV production. - @Saronic , on the other hand is constructing a massive 1000' building and focused entirely on MUSV + building new capacity. - HII / Breaux Brothers Enterprises Inc - interestingly the team did not call out whether a MUSV is under construction here. They called out ships under construction in every other yard, so it's possible HII is waiting for stronger demand signal to build a MUSV. - Navy consistently says it wants to build auxiliaries and unmanned vessels at these small yards. But Navy is also exploring building larger auxiliaries overseas... This podcast gives deckplate perspective on active construction across 11 shipyards, including ships: - Arctic Security Cutter - LIBERTY and MARAUDER Medium USVs - BOUGANVILLE Assault Ship - FRANK M. NEAL Destroyer - PICKERING Offshore Patrol Cutter - BILLY FRANKS JUNIOR Salvage and Towing Tug Well done for stomping through the deep south in August. @USNINews

🤖 ⛵ What is the true shape of the maritime autonomy stack? Navigation is sexy - so many pursue it - but it’s just one layer. 🤔 When we started Blue Water, I was averse to following other companies’ focus on navigation autonomy. Doing so would have been undifferentiated. So we went after the least sexy layer, the darkest dungeon at the bottom of the maritime autonomy stack: engine room autonomy. But a ship is more too than just an engine room and a bridge. There are many, many layers in a ship’s autonomy stack. What I’ve shared below is a new framework to think about the map of maritime autonomy. This is a simple 6-layer visual to orient collaborative discussions around answering a simple question: “Where in the stack are you?” 🗺️ C2 and Supervisory  ⚔️ Mission Autonomy  🧭 Navigation Autonomy  🎥 Perception & Sensor Fusion 🚣 Autopilot & Dynamic Positioning 🤖 Engineering Autonomy & MCS The bottom 4 layers live almost entirely on the vessel, while the top 2 must live both on the vessel and in the cloud. These 6 do not include - but rely every second on - a few other inputs into their architecture. 1️⃣ Collaborative autonomy 2️⃣ Payload autonomy 3️⃣ Automatic Target Recognition For now, I've just shared how we're thinking about the stack - not mapping specific companies onto it. Down the road, we may be able to share a "market map" of which companies solve which problems within this framework. Stay tuned! *Credit to much sharper brains like Josh McColister and Joseph Hughes for developing this framework so that a colorblind guy like me can at least tweet about it. #maritime #autonomy #maritimeautonomy #autonomousships #usv #uuv #umv #uxv

The Naval Oceanographic Office "NAVO" has awarded Blue Water a spot on a $40M IDIQ for deep-ocean, high-endurance survey. While orgs like NAVO, NOAA, and big Navy have long studied the depths of the Pacific and Indian Oceans, only recently have they turned to USVs to conduct oceanographic surveys. Deep-ocean survey fits Blue Water USV strengths well: high-endurance, open oceans, long, dull missions you don't need humans for. Blue Water is proud to support NAVO's mission against Chinese and Russian undersea forces in INDOPACOM. Congrats to our team and partners who made this happen - see you on the water! 👉 Link to Press Release: prnewswire.com/news-releases…

Ex-military entrepreneurs are leveraging 21st-century technology to build better, smarter weapons. This AI-powered defense tech revolution is backed by a record $32 billion in venture funding since 2022 and will create generational fortunes—and forever change how we wage war. Read more: forbes.com/sites/monicahunte… Photo: Aaron Kotowski, Jamel Toppin, Ethan Pines for Forbes

It's a bird! It's a plane! It's... A surf foiler, caught on camera by our team during autonomous vessel testing off the coast of Rhode Island this week. Most testing for autonomous ships, including traditional Navy tests, focuses on detecting other ships. But out on the water, a vessel needs to detect, track, and safely navigate around everything it encounters, from wildlife to small craft to, apparently, surf foilers, with cameras, radar, infrared, and other sensors working together to build that picture. What's the most unexpected thing you've seen on the water? Image 1: Person standing on a hydrofoil board Image 2: Person paddling a on a hydrofoil board

Our co-founder @AustinEGray presented this year’s Sea Services Award alongside the Secretary of the Navy, Chief of Naval Operations, Commandant of the Marines Corps, and Commandant of the Coast Guard. Each year this award goes to a member of Congress who shows deep commitment to helping the sea services work with Congress. We are proud to work with these leaders, from both branches of government, to drive naval innovation forward and build the future fleet.

Happy 4th of July from Blue Water Autonomy's headquarters in Lexington, MA, where the Revolution began. 250 years later, that same spirit of determination and service drives our team. We're building autonomous ships that strengthen American shipbuilding and keep our sailors out of harm's way, carrying forward the same fight for freedom and democracy that started on this ground. Wishing everyone a safe and joyful Independence Day! #America250

Enjoyed sitting down with Marine Link to talk Liberty Ships

Happy 250th, America. 🇺🇸 As part of the broader #America250 celebrations taking place across the country, we were honored to cohost one of the first #Sail250 events with Conrad Shipyard. For generations, American shipbuilders have designed, welded, launched, and delivered the vessels that power our economy and support our national security. That tradition runs deep in Louisiana, where Conrad has been building ships for 75 years. As America turns 250, we're proud to be building Liberty in Louisiana and revitalizing America's maritime future. Meet the people making it happen. @newindustrials @tulipinterfaces @ValstadShip 🎥 Check out the full video on our YouTube channel: piped.video/6KfEyN3ij1g

Train like you fight. Test what you build. Deliver on schedule.