HII<\/a> press release:<\/em><\/p>\nHII, America\u2019s largest military shipbuilder and the global leader in autonomous seapower, was awarded a contract by the U.S. Navy to build 10 ROMULUS unmanned surface vessels (USVs) for the Medium Unmanned Surface Vessel (MUSV) program. The award marks a major advancement in the U.S. Navy\u2019s transition from experimentation to fleet-scale deployment of trusted, operational autonomy across the maritime domain.<\/em><\/p>\n\u201cHII has made deliberate, early investments in the development of autonomous systems, advancing capabilities essential to the Navy\u2019s hedge strategy,\u201d said Chris Kastner, HII president and CEO. \u201cWe remain firmly committed to supporting the U.S. Navy\u2019s vision and accelerating this critical capability from production to operational deployment.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\nThe U.S. Navy\u2019s selection underscores HII\u2019s shipbuilding expertise and leadership in proven autonomous unmanned surface and underwater maritime systems to deliver reliable production at the speed and scale required for emerging unmanned fleet production and operations.<\/em><\/p>\nAt the core of ROMULUS is HII\u2019s Odyssey Autonomous Control Solutions (ACS), a combat-tested autonomy suite that enables trusted, coordinated operations across surface and undersea domains. HII has delivered more than 750 REMUS unmanned underwater vehicles (UUVs) to customers in more than 30 countries. Together, ROMULUS, REMUS and Odyssey ACS provide a scalable foundation for autonomous maritime operations supporting the U.S. Navy and allied fleets.<\/em><\/p>\nIn 2025, HII committed to securing the partners, production capacity, supplier network and infrastructure needed to move quickly from design and development to construction of ROMULUS USVs. That investment reflected HII\u2019s continued support of the U.S. Navy\u2019s unmanned maritime priorities and advancing the unmanned surface program with mature technology and a production-ready approach. By beginning work in 2025, HII positioned the ROMULUS program for accelerated delivery, reduced production risk and to provide the U.S. Navy with a scalable path to fielding autonomous unmanned surface capabilities at the pace the nation demands.<\/em><\/p>\n\u201cUnmanned vessels ultimately must be built, integrated, tested and sustained as part of a fleet,\u201d said Andy Green, president of HII\u2019s Mission Technologies division. \u201cAs the nation\u2019s largest shipbuilder, HII understands that challenge from both sides. By pairing our advanced cutting-edge technologies with our shipbuilding expertise, and leveraging experienced regional partners and suppliers, we are creating a production ecosystem capable of delivering reliable autonomous platforms at the pace and scale the U.S. Navy requires.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\nOdyssey ACS: The Autonomy Behind ROMULUS<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\nA key differentiator of ROMULUS is HII\u2019s Odyssey ACS, a modular, open-architecture autonomy suite developed from decades of experience designing, building, operating and sustaining unmanned maritime systems.<\/em><\/p>\nOdyssey is designed to deliver consistent, predictable autonomous behavior, a requirement for the U.S. Navy\u2019s transition from experimentation to operational deployment. It provides decision-making architecture that enables unmanned systems to perceive their surroundings, navigate, manage onboard systems and payloads, coordinate with other manned and unmanned platforms, and execute complex missions with limited human intervention.<\/em><\/p>\nOdyssey\u2019s modular, open-architecture lets the U.S. Navy and allied partners rapidly integrate emerging sensors, command-and-control (C2) technologies and AI algorithms, ensuring ROMULUS remains upgrade-ready for evolving threat environments.<\/em><\/p>\nHII, with its partners Applied Intuition, Greenroom Robotics and Rodi Marine, successfully completed the evaluation phase of the MUSV program. HII\u2019s Odyssey ACS vessel capabilities were validated through a series of operationally representative test events, demonstrating performance, reliability and mission readiness. The U.S. Navy-monitored testing took place in the Gulf of America over a 13-day period and evaluated the system under demanding, real-world operating conditions.<\/em><\/p>\nThe most rigorous event was a long-endurance mission simulation. HII\u2019s autonomy system successfully completed the full 420-nautical-mile mission over 28 hours, meeting all established success criteria and demonstrating the endurance and autonomous performance required for sustained maritime operations.<\/em><\/p>\nDesigned and Built by Shipbuilders for Scale<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\nFor ROMULUS, HII is combining that expertise with a distributed production model that leverages regional shipbuilders and manufacturing partners. This approach expands available production capacity, strengthens the U.S. maritime industrial base and enables vessels to be produced efficiently and repeatedly as U.S. Navy demand grows.<\/em><\/p>\nHII is working with Gulf Coast build partners including Breaux Brothers Enterprises, Halimar Shipyard and Bayou Metal Supply & Manufacturing in Louisiana to support ROMULUS production, and developed in partnership with Beier Integrated Systems and Incat Crowther.<\/em><\/p>\nHII also recently announced a new10,000-square-foot expansion to increase the capacity of HII\u2019s existing 40,000-square-foot unmanned manufacturing production campus capacity to build, develop and integrate advanced unmanned and autonomous maritime systems for both the REMUS family of UUVs and ROMULUS USVs.<\/em><\/p>\nThe model allows major components and assemblies to be produced efficiently before final vessel integration, increasing throughput and creating a repeatable production architecture that can scale across the ROMULUS USV family.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"HII announced a U.S. Navy contract to build 10 ROMULUS unmanned surface vessels under the Medium Unmanned Surface Vessel program, following completion of the program\u2019s evaluation phase. HII press release: HII, America\u2019s largest military shipbuilder and the global leader in autonomous seapower, was awarded a contract by the U.S. Navy to build 10 ROMULUS unmanned […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":48,"featured_media":450947,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4127,58726,4509,2296,2323],"tags":[58850,66162],"class_list":["post-450940","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-all-news","category-defense-industry","category-headlines-en-tr","category-naval-en","category-usa-en","tag-hii-en-2","tag-romulus-en"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/defensehere.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/450940","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/defensehere.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/defensehere.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/defensehere.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/48"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/defensehere.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=450940"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/defensehere.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/450940\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/defensehere.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/450947"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/defensehere.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=450940"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/defensehere.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=450940"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/defensehere.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=450940"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}