Anduril to build $3.7bn Baltimore shipyard for US Navy submarine parts

Anduril will invest $3.7bn in a new shipyard near Baltimore to build parts for the US Navy’s Virginia-class submarines, the defence company said on Tuesday . The Navy has also awarded Anduril a contract worth up to $2.9bn, with payments tied to demonstrated production outcomes. Together, that is $6.6bn for the submarine industrial base.

President Donald Trump announced the project, called Arsenal-2, at the site in Sparrows Point, Maryland.

“Today we’re officially launching the construction of the largest new shipyard in the United States,” Trump said.

The yard will sit at Tradepoint Atlantic, on a 187-acre plot in Baltimore County. Anduril plans more than 2 million square feet of production space. It says the project will create 3,100 direct jobs and support more than 11,000 indirect ones. Initial operations are expected in 2030.

Arsenal-2 will make complex components and large assemblies for the submarines. It will ship them to General Dynamics Electric Boat and Huntington Ingalls Industries’ Newport News Shipbuilding, which build the boats. Anduril’s own software, ArsenalOS, will run the yard’s production systems.

Work starts earlier in California. A new 160,000-square-foot Anduril facility in Orange County will make submarine components, including torpedo tubes, before the Maryland yard opens.

Maryland will offer incentives worth up to 13% of the private investment, the governor’s office said .

“Right here in Sparrows Point, you’ll build the next generation of American submarines, including autonomous subs,” Trump said in his speech.

Anduril president Chris Brose told reporters that the main focus was components for the Virginia class, not new drone platforms, according to Reuters and AFP via Al Jazeera .

“This is about putting more food on the table and being able to meet the requirements that our country has to produce more submarines,” Brose said at a press briefing.

The Pentagon wants two new Virginia-class boats a year. Deliveries have stalled at 1.1 to 1.2 a year, according to Al Jazeera. A July report by the Government Accountability Office blamed late material deliveries and a limited skilled workforce, Business Insider reported . Adm. Daryl Caudle, the chief of naval operations, has said he expects two a year by 2032.

The contract came days after the Pentagon named Anduril co-founder Palmer Luckey to Project Meridian , a group studying future weapons. CNBC reported that the timing raised questions over defence tech’s growing sway in Washington. Trump thanked Luckey by name on Tuesday, calling him a “friend”, CNBC reported.

Emil Michael, the Pentagon’s chief technology officer, rejected concerns about a conflict of interest.

Marc Andreessen, whose venture firm backs Anduril, joined the Pentagon’s policy board in the summer, CNBC noted. Anduril raised $5bn in May.