The Air Force Wants Swarms of Autonomous Vehicles. So Does the Navy.

Anduril Industries makes the Long Range Sentry. (Courtesy Anduril Industries)

Key Points

• Anduril and HD Hyundai Heavy Industries are partnering to develop Autonomous Surface Vessels for the Navy’s MASC program.
• The MASC program aims to create a hybrid fleet by integrating low-cost autonomous vessels with more expensive manned systems.
• Anduril specializes in merging AI with non-exquisite technologies to provide cost-effective defense solutions for the military.

AI is changing everything, including warfare. Future conflict won’t be won by brute force alone; victory will depend on a military’s ability to rapidly produce and integrate low-cost autonomous assets with more complex ”exquisite” manned systems.

The Pentagon, of course, knows this and is moving to add AI-trained autonomous capabilities in the sky and on the sea.

Thursday, privately held defense contractor Anduril announced a partnership with shipbuilder HD Hyundai Heavy Industries to “design and produce a new class of dual-use Autonomous Surface Vessels.”

The program is part of the Navy’s Modular Attack Surface Craft, or MASC, program, which aims to accelerate its transition to a hybrid fleet. Hybrid, in this instance, refers to pairing lower-cost unmanned and higher-cost manned vessels.

Investors can think of MASC like the Air Force’s Collaborative Combat Aircraft program, which aims to match manned fighter jets with autonomous drones, simultaneously improving lethality while keeping human pilots safer.

MASC vessels will be autonomous and “non-exquisite,” which means relatively low-cost and easy to manufacture. An “exquisite” piece of military hardware for the Navy might be an aircraft carrier, which takes billions of dollars and years to build, integrating hundreds of bespoke, high-end technologies.

Andruil, which is valued at some $30 billion in private markets, according to Rainmaker Securities, is the disruptive defense player specializing in merging AI with those non-exquisite technologies. Founder Palmer Luckey essentially wants Anduril to become a “store” for the U.S. military and its allies, making lower-cost, smart solutions from easy-to-source technologies that can be purchased off the shelf. Exquisite technologies like ships and jets are bid out to contractors, and then designed over a number of years with contractors and the military tweaking capabilities and costs.

“China is outbuilding the American fleet at a rate of three-to-one and using its coast guard and maritime militia to challenge freedom of navigation across expanding areas in the Pacific. Russia continues to test Western access in the Black Sea and Arctic,” said Anduril in its announcement. “The economics of defending commercial shipping from drones using exquisite military assets is not sustainable. To preserve maritime security, the United States must regain the ability to build, field, and modernize ships quickly.”

MASC is the latest foray for Anduril into unmanned autonomous technologies. It’s developing the “Ghost Shark” undersea vehicle with the Royal Australian Navy. It’s unmanned “Fury” collaborative aircraft recently made its first flight.

Write to Al Root at allen.root@dowjones.com