IRIA News

The U.S. Navy has selected three industry-leading companies to prototype and develop Unmanned Underwater Vehicle (UUV) platforms. These three companies include Anduril Industries, Kongsberg Discovery, and Oceaneering International.

The U.S. Navy’s Program Office Advanced Undersea Systems (PMS 394) partnered with the Defense Innovation Unit (DIU), the U.S. Department of Defense’s commercial innovation hub, to explore commercial undersea drone development. Each selected company has a functional UUV platform or prototype specifically tailored to meet the Pentagon’s requirements.

DIU has granted prototype agreements to Oceaneering International, Kongsberg Discovery, and Anduril Industries after a thorough evaluation process. These agreements underscore the significance of enhancing underwater capabilities, harnessing unmanned systems, and addressing current and future maritime threats in a cost-effective manner. The successful prototypes will facilitate future advancements in Subsea and Seabed Warfare (SSW) and Undersea Warfare (USW) missions.

“Undersea warfare is critical to success in the Pacific and other contested environments, providing needed autonomous underwater sensing and payload delivery in dispersed, long-range, deep and contested environments is key. Crewed submarines are high-value, high-resource capital platforms necessary for crucial combat missions. In particular, the U.S. military requires a fleet of Large Displacement Unmanned Underwater Vehicles (LDUUVs) with diverse capabilities,” according to a DIU release.

Kongsberg HUGIN autonomous underwater vehicle

Kongsberg Discovery, the U.S. subsidiary of Norwegian defense group Kongsberg, confirmed that it has been awarded a contract by DIU to deliver HUGIN autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) systems capabilities for the U.S. military. The contract entails the potential acquisition of HUGIN Endurance and HUGIN Superior deep-water AUV systems, which offer advanced capabilities for unsupervised shore-to-shore operations and extended endurance.

HUGIN Endurance, one of the newest AUV systems, is the biggest and most capable with 15-day endurance, enabling unsupervised shore-to-shore operations over a 1,200 nm range. HUGIN Superior is a 70-hour endurance vehicle. Both vehicles come equipped with a comprehensive suite of Kongsberg’s sensors, offering Intelligence Preparation of the Operational Environment (IPoE), Mine Counter Measure (MCM), Seabed Warfare (SBW), and seafloor mapping capabilities upon delivery.

“With HUGIN Endurance we are pushing the boundaries for autonomous over-the-horizon AUV operations. We are excited to bring our many years of AUV experience in support of the U.S. Government and look forward to closely partnering with DIU and the U.S. Navy to support making their LDUUV program a reality,” Martin Wien Fjell, President of Kongsberg Discovery, remarked.

Oceaneering Freedom AUV

Oceaneering’s Aerospace and Defense Technologies business segment said that it has secured a contract from the DIU to develop and test the Freedom autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) as a potential Large Displacement Unmanned Undersea Vehicle (LDUUV) prototype for the U.S. Navy. The contract includes a manufacturing readiness review to assess current production capacity and tradeoffs for expediting LDUUV capabilities to the fleet.

The Freedom AUV recently concluded a five-year test and development program, commencing commercial operations in 2023. With eight independent thrusters, Freedom enhances mission success by enabling low-altitude, precision operations in complex subsea infrastructure environments.

“Oceaneering is pleased to have been selected by the U.S. Navy and the DIU for this program supporting the development of LDUUV capabilities. The Freedom AUV offers the flexibility needed to support mission critical operations and we are delighted to be recognized for the flexibility Freedom offers and its suitability to support an LDUUV prototype,” Martin McDonald, Senior Vice President of Subsea Robotics at Oceaneering, said.

Anduril to develop AI-powered undersea drone

One of the contracts has been awarded to the U.S.-based defense technology company Anduril Industries to build a prototype for the Dive Large Diameter (Dive-LD) autonomous underwater vehicle.

Anduril announced that the DIU has finalized the project under which Anduril would build a prototype of a long-range, persistent underwater sensing and payload delivery large autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) for the United States Navy.

The award comes after DIU selected the Dive-LD platform to perform in a “swim-off” last year that put commercially available large unmanned underwater vehicles through an obstacle course to assess their maturity and adaptability. Anduril’s Dive-LD was selected based on its performance in the competition, the company said in a statement.

The statement added that this recent contract would allow operational units to borrow the unmanned vehicles for experiments or buy them as routine tools for their missions. The company could not disclose information about the value or duration of the contract, which was awarded through DIU’s Commercial Solutions Opening process.

Anduril’s chief strategy officer, Chris Brose, said that the company has been working on maturing the design and performance of the Dive-LD vehicle for the last two years. He said that the latest contract would provide a mechanism to get the drone into the hands of sailors across varied geographies and unit types so they can “start solving a lot of different problems across the seabed and undersea domain.”

Amid escalating tensions in the Indo-Pacific region, particularly at sea, the Department of Defense (DoD) has been ramping up efforts to develop various autonomous systems that can swiftly be substituted in case of damage. This strategic initiative seeks to dissuade potential threats, enhance the military’s operational range, and establish a sizable and cost-effective presence.

The U.S. Navy initiated the Snakehead large-diameter unmanned underwater vehicle program in 2017, however, the inaugural Snakehead prototype did not meet the standards until 2022, prompting the Navy and Congress to mutually decide on the program’s cancellation later that same year.

Apart from the U.S. Navy, several other naval forces in the world are exploring the prospects of AI-powered underwater autonomous vehicles. Recently, Anduril entered into a co-development partnership with the Royal Australian Navy and the Defense Science and Technology Group to work on the development of Extra Large Autonomous Undersea Vehicles (XLAUV).

Dive-LD – a flexible autonomous underwater vehicle

Anduril’s Dive-LD is an ideal candidate for the U.S. Navy as it has already been in service for several commercial projects. Its notable features include rapid deployment, extensive scalability, and cost-effectiveness, positioning it as one of the most economically viable choices in its category.

“The Dive-LD has a flexible & unique architecture capable of rapid integration of complex payloads or multi-sensor suites. It is ideal for a variety of missions such as undersea battlespace intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, mine counter-warfare, anti-submarine warfare, seafloor mapping, and more,” Anduril explains.