Blue Water Autonomy, Inc., Boston, Mass., has announced plans to develop a fully autonomous, uncrewed ship for the U.S. Navy. The company, founded in 2024 by former personnel from Amazon Robotics, iRobot, and the U.S. Navy, announced that it has raised $14 million in seed funding from Eclipse, Riot, and Impatient Ventures.
The company is focused on building a scalable, ocean-going autonomous platform capable of performing multiple missions in open water, it said in a press release. Blue Water also said it has completed initial salt-water testing and early ship design concepts. The funding will go toward expanding Blue Water's engineering team, further testing, and integrating payloads.
"Sea power has been the bedrock of America's security and prosperity for centuries," said Rylan Hamilton, co-founder and CEO of Blue Water Autonomy. "We believe the entire maritime economy is in need of transformation — it starts with supporting the U.S. Navy which needs dynamic industrial partners to bring top technology to its sailors, including ocean-going, fully autonomous ships."
Blue Water’s founders and staff include both roboticists and Navy veterans. The company’s leadership claims prior experience delivering hundreds of robotic products and deploying millions of robots in commercial applications.
"The U.S. military needs more than incremental improvements to meet the moment and maintain its status on the global stage," said Seth Winterroth, partner at Eclipse. "Autonomous ships are critical to enable the Navy to continue securing deterrence given the threat of China and Russia and the importance of shipping lanes in the Pacific. We previously backed Rylan at 6 River Systems and have seen first-hand his ability to scale a full stack technology company from concept to exit. No other company is tackling this problem at the ship level like Blue Water. The team is a rare combination of roboticists and Navy veterans that positions them to be a critical partner to the Navy, the entire Department of Defense, and will have a major impact on the maritime industry."
The Navy is expected to integrate autonomous vessels with its current fleet, including destroyers, submarines, and carriers. Blue Water Autonomy anticipates that its uncrewed systems will eventually expand beyond defense applications into commercial sectors such as cargo transport, offshore energy, and luxury marine operations.
