U.S. Navy orders 10 of Saronic’s 180-foot autonomous ships

The U.S. Navy will buy 10 of Saronic’s Marauder autonomous ships, a 55-meter (180-foot) uncrewed vessel built in Louisiana, after the ship passed at-sea testing under the service’s new Medium Unmanned Surface Vessel program.

Saronic announced the production award on Sept. 30, a day after the U.S. Navy said it had given production agreements for 10 medium unmanned surface vessels each to Saronic, Huntington Ingalls Industries and Galliano Marine Services. The U.S. Navy put the average cost at about $40 million per vessel, with deliveries starting as early as the fourth quarter of fiscal 2027, which begins in July 2027.

The awards were made as other transaction agreements, a faster contracting route outside traditional procurement rules, and the service did not specify how much each company received, USNI News reported. Saronic also did not disclose the value of its agreement.

Marauder is designed mainly for logistics and carrying modular payloads. Saronic says it can haul up to 150 metric tons, enough for four 40-foot or eight 20-foot shipping containers, and cruise at 12 knots with sprints above 25 knots. The company lists its range at 10,000 km (5,400 nautical miles) with a light load and 7,600 km (4,100 nautical miles) fully loaded. It can run fully on its own or under remote human supervision.

According to Saronic, the U.S. Navy’s trials had Marauder autonomously track and maneuver around other vessels, and then detect, track and follow ships using only passive onboard sensors, with its radar switched off. Operating without radar means a ship gives off fewer signals an enemy could detect. Saronic said the vessel ran more than 140 test scenarios without failure over eight days of round-the-clock operations, gCaptain reported.

“Marauder went from initial design to on-the-water in under a year, and this evaluation demonstrated that the platform holds up under the Navy’s own toughest testing,” said Dino Mavrookas, CEO and co-founder of Saronic.

“We’ve now flipped our third Marauder hull, with several more moving through the production line behind it,” Mavrookas said.

Saronic launched its first Marauder in May at its shipyard in Franklin, Louisiana, where the company is investing $300 million to add three new slips and a dedicated production line for the ship. Saronic has said it aims to eventually build up to 20 Marauders a year there, and it tests and commissions finished vessels at the Port of Gulfport in Mississippi.

The U.S. Navy launched the MUSV Marketplace in March after scrapping its Modular Attack Surface Craft prototyping effort. Under the new approach, companies paid for their own vessels and were rewarded only if they passed the U.S. Navy’s on-water tests. Seven companies were picked for at-sea testing in May: Saronic, HII, Galliano, Leidos, PacMar Technologies, Sea Machines and Birdon.

Six of them passed. Leidos, PacMar and Sea Machines each receive $15 million and join an online marketplace where commands across the Department of War can place follow-on orders, while Birdon was not among those advancing. The U.S. Navy is funding the first 30 vessels with money from last year’s reconciliation law and has already opened a second phase aimed at additional MUSV types, including larger logistics vessels. The first round has also drawn a legal challenge: Blue Water Autonomy and Saildrone have sued the U.S. Navy, arguing it did not follow its own criteria when choosing the companies for testing.

Marauder is Saronic’s second U.S. Navy production program. The Austin, Texas, company already builds its 7-meter (24-foot) Corsair autonomous boat under a $392 million U.S. Navy production contract, and it raised $1.75 billion earlier this year at a $9.25 billion valuation.