Huntington Ingalls Industries Planning for Increased U.S. Navy Demand for UUVs - USNI News

Huntington Ingalls Industries is restructuring its shipbuilding businesses to tap into the Navy’s growing demand for unmanned undersea vehicles.

The Navy will still buy the large capital ships and big-deck amphibious warships that HII has built and plans to build for decades. However, the Navy’s appetite for UUVs to amplify the presence of large manned platforms will only grow, Mike Petters, chief executive of HII, said Thursday while discussing 2019 financial results during a conference call with analysts.

“You’re not going to see a hard-left turn here, where we’re going to say, OK we don’t need big platforms with people on them anymore and we’re going to have a Navy that’s completely unmanned,” Petters said. “I think what you’re going to see is an evolution.”

With tightening government spending and a shipbuilding budget squeezed by the massive Columbia-class submarine program, Petters said the evolution is occurring now.