Newport News drives HII's shipbuilding margin gain

The Navy is looking for domestic shipyards interested in and capable of serving as "a prime construction yard(s)" for SSN(X), its planned successor to the Virginia-class attack submarine.^2–3 The SSN(X) program office, PMS 351, issued the sources-sought notice with the Navy's directors of submarine programs and of design and construction, and Naval Sea Systems Command's Team Submarine office posted it Friday.^{1, 3} It is market research meant to "baseline current domestic industrial capabilities, identify future capital expenditure requirements, and inform acquisition strategies."³

Today only two U.S. shipyards can build nuclear-powered ships: General Dynamics Electric Boat and HII's Newport News Shipbuilding. They build each Virginia-class boat jointly. Earlier submarines were each built entirely in one yard, and the Congressional Research Service lists which approach SSN(X) should follow among the program's issues for Congress.² The notice's "yard(s)" leaves the number of prime yards open.³

The bar is infrastructure for "large-scale nuclear submarine construction." Prime yards must be capable of complete hull fabrication, modular outfitting, reactor compartment installation and post-delivery testing, with graving docks or floating drydocks and gantry cranes that can lift submarine modules. Any responsible source may respond, but incomplete questionnaires will not be reviewed. The program office wants detail on each candidate's capacity, drydock availability, tooling and design workforce to determine its readiness for "a long-duration capital combatant construction program."³

Anduril's route into Virginia-class submarine construction runs through the two companies already building the boats, General Dynamics Electric Boat and Huntington Ingalls Industries' Newport News Shipbuilding. Its planned shipyard, Arsenal-2, will build "complex components and large scale assemblies" of the submarine and deliver them to both for final assembly. The yard will go up at Tradepoint Atlantic in Baltimore County, Maryland.¹

Anduril's $6.6 billion headline figure combines two kinds of money. One is $3.7 billion of private capital that Anduril is putting behind the yard. The other is a Navy contract that Anduril says is worth up to $2.9 billion, with payments tied "directly to demonstrated production outcomes." Anduril says that structure leaves the company, "not the taxpayer," with "the majority of the execution risk."¹

Permitting and site preparation begin immediately, with construction to start once the necessary approvals are in place. Initial operations are expected in 2030. The submarine work also has a California address: a new 160,000-square-foot facility in Orange County will manufacture Virginia-class components and support prototyping and production of test assets and maritime components, including torpedo tubes.¹