Blue Water Autonomy scales up autonomous ship program with new manufacturing model

May 8, 2026, by Fatima Bahtić

Boston-based technology and shipbuilding company Blue Water Autonomy has forged strategic partnerships to scale the production of its next-generation, autonomous vessels.

The announcement builds on the company’s recent introduction of its Liberty class, a 58-meter autonomous ship designed for the US Navy, currently under construction at Conrad Shipyard.

Blue Water Autonomy unveils Liberty-class autonomous ship developed with Damen

Vessels

It comes as the navy and broader defense ecosystem accelerate toward producible, autonomous ships, in support of the Medium Unmanned Surface Vessels program, the fleet’s largest unmanned initiative with more than $6 billion of funding.

Blue Water’s manufacturing model relies on a network of industry partners responsible for key shipbuilding systems and production infrastructure. Tulip provides the company’s manufacturing execution system, which is used to coordinate production activities and monitor operations on the factory floor in real time.

Caterpillar Defense supplies the marine diesel engines selected for the vessels, while Precise Power Systems develops integrated containerized engine modules intended for long-duration autonomous operations. Valstad contributes manufacturing automation technologies, including modular structural panel systems and robotic fabrication cells designed to support distributed ship production.

Together, these partners are expected to enable Blue Water to digitize and orchestrate shipbuilding from the ground up, transforming traditionally manual, fragmented processes into a scalable, software-defined production system.

“Traditional shipbuilding doesn’t scale, and pure software approaches don’t deliver hardware,” said Rylan Hamilton, CEO of Blue Water Autonomy.

“We’re doing both. Integrating proven marine systems with AI-driven manufacturing and operations to fundamentally rethink how ships are built. By distributing and parallelizing work across proven partners, we’re creating a production system that can move at the pace required for a modern maritime industrial base.”

“Shipbuilding has always required extraordinary coordination, and we’re giving that coordination a software backbone,” said Erik Mirandette, Chief Business Officer at Tulip.

“Tulip connects every step on the factory floor with real-time data and AI-native tools, so Blue Water can orchestrate production at scale, catch issues earlier, and build with the speed and reliability that modern maritime demands.”