Physical AI, robotics revive lagging U.S. shipbuilding

Physical AI is playing a critical role in maritime shipbuilding worldwide and could provide the U.S. a much-needed boost in shipbuilding production for commercial and military applications. The U.S. over the past few decades has fallen far behind China, South Korea and Japan in commercial shipbuilding, according to a 2025 report on global shipbuilding output by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development. And while the U.S. leads the world in naval fleet tonnage for military applications, a 2026 report by consultancy BCG warns that the U.S. faces a "significant gap" between its current shipbuilding production rates and cumulative production targets for 2034. "The U.S. Navy operates the most complex ships in the world, but the U.S. shipbuilding industry can't build them quickly enough," according to the report. " Currently, the Navy is receiving just half of the annual ship production it needs, creating threats to both national security and economic resilience." To accelerate shipbuilding, the Navy announced a $448 million "strategic investment" in AI and autonomy technologies. "[W]e're helping the shipbuilding industry improve schedules, increase capacity and reduce costs," said Secretary of the Navy John Phelan in a statement. "This is about doing business smarter and building the industrial capability our Navy and nation require." In addition, $26 billion was allocated for military shipbuilding in the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2026 passed in December 2025. Physical AI provides end-to-end shipbuilding Physical AI combines artificial intelligence with robotics, real-time sensors and computer vision to speed shipyard operations, increase shipbuilding volume and automate labor-intensive tasks like welding, surface preparation, grinding and coating. Our goal is to integrate data across design, production, logistics, quality control and maintenance into a unified, holistic system built on a single thread of continuous and connected data. Yeong Ung Ryu Senior vice president, HD Korea Shipbuilding and Offshore Engineering The technology will "fundamentally innovate the way ships are built," said Yeong Ung Ryu, senior vice president at HD Korea Shipbuilding and Offshore Engineering. "Our goal is to integrate data across design, production, logistics, quality control and maintenance into a unified, holistic system built on a single thread of continuous and connected data." Physical AI perceives real-time environmental changes, autonomously determines the optimal work methods and automates "nonstandardized tasks that were beyond the reach of conventional automation," he added. Shipbuilders deploying physical AI are documenting promising results. For example, submarine schedule planning was reduced from 160 manual hours to less than 10 minutes in a pilot deployment at General Dynamics Electric Boat in Groton, Conn., according to the U.S. Navy. Seaspan Shipyards with operations in North Vancouver and Victoria, B.C., found that a simulation model from BigBear.ai detected workflow inefficiencies and helped the shipbuilder improve on-time project delivery by 25% and reduce planning-related overhead and manual interventions by 30%. Siemens is working with HD Hyundai, one of the world's largest shipbuilders, to integrate physical AI into all aspects of the company's shipbuilding functions, including engineering, production planning, simulation, automation and operations. "The project aims to connect the entire shipbuilding process through a single data flow and ... support collaboration, learning and decision-making," said Brittany Ng, vice president, maritime, at Siemens Digital Industries Software. "Rather than simply analyzing data, physical AI enables shipbuilders to model, predict and improve engineering, production planning, manufacturing and shipyard operations before work begins and continuously optimize those operations during execution," Ng explained. The project also intends to compensate for shortages in skilled craftsmen such as welders and eliminate typical waiting times between shipbuilding processes. Due to the complexity and scale of shipbuilding, the U.S.'s largest military shipbuilder Huntington Ingalls Industries (HII), Newport News, Va., is using physical AI technologies for tasks such as welding, assembly, surface prep, inspection and painting. "We're looking at taking a series of technologies and then integrating them to change how we do an entire value stream," said Eric Chewning, executive vice president of maritime systems and corporate strategy at HII. What we're trying to do is automate parts of the shipbuilding value stream that are currently creating bottlenecks but aren't the best use of our skilled craftspeople. Sean Cassady Director of operations and technology strategy, HII HII launched the High-Yield Production Robotics (HYPR) program to network with physical AI providers Path Robotics and GrayMatter Robotics to automate tasks such as welding, assembly, surface prep, inspection and painting, Chewning said. "It all comes down to our ability to accelerate delivery of capability to the U.S. Navy," he explained. "[W]e think physical AI is one of a set of technologies that holds a lot of promise for modernizing shipbuilding in the United States." Rather than replacing employees with robots, HII plans to use physical AI to augment the workforce , said Sean Cassady, director of operations and technology strategy at HII. "What we're trying to do is automate parts of the shipbuilding value stream that are currently creating bottlenecks but aren't the best use of our skilled craftspeople. If we get to the point where HYPR is successful, then all of our skilled trades or skilled welders can be doing the work that automation still can't do in building and outfitting superstructures, putting together final assembly of the ship. There are additional bottlenecks, and we need to refocus our workforce around those areas." HII's shipbuilding production increased 14% in 2025, Chewning reported, "and we're targeting another 15% increase this year." Physical AI takes on hazardous welding tasks Welding is one of the skilled labor shortages in shipbuilding where physical AI is playing a key role. "Welding is definitely the definition of a dirty, dangerous job," said Andy Lonsberry, CEO and co-founder of Path Robotics, citing long-term harm to eyes and lungs. "Submarine-safe welding is some of the highest hurdles in terms of quality to get to first pass yield. That's really what we wanted to set out to do -- make a system learn how to weld so that it can eventually be a superhuman welding system to take on these really hard tasks that only really skilled humans could do today." The Path Robotics welding devices move on their own, including a mobile robotic dog welding system. "It's fully autonomous," Lonsberry explained. "They run on the exact same stack and the input ... is a 3D CAD model that's describing the geometry, where to weld and what your weld process specifications are. The robotic systems take that input and do their own full planning, completely zero human in the loop for locomotion or mobility, all welding and execution." The urgency to build more ships at a faster rate, particularly in the U.S., "is really high right now," Lonsberry said. "That's driven from [the Trump] administration and other global forces to see the United States be able to start to produce at a rate that we once could." Chuck Martin, a New York Times bestselling author, futurist, speaker and columnist, has been a thought leader in emerging digital technologies for more than three decades.