The Southern California-based high-tech company best known for its aerial drones and its semi-portable surveillance systems is now turning the spotlight on its undersea unmanned vehicles (UUVs).
An Extra-Large Autonomous Undersea Vehicle (XL-AUV) built by Anduril Industries just concluded a 100-hour voyage, which the company says is the longest ever for a vehicle of this class.
According to a news release earlier this month, the Dive-XL will conduct a 1,000-nautical-mile fully submerged mission in the first half of 2025.
In 2022, Anduril announced that the Royal Australian Navy had signed a $100 million contract for three Dive-XL vehicles, which are being used in its Ghost Shark program. Ghost Shark, Anduril says, is a “modular, multi-purpose capability that can flexibly respond to the Australian Defence Force’s mission requirements, creating an agile force multiplier for Defence.”
The vessel is designed for underwater intelligence gathering and long-range surveillance and can be deployed from one shipping container. That allows warfighters, according to Anduril, to launch, use, and recover the system at sea or ashore with minimal infrastructure and heavy equipment.
The Southern California-based high-tech company best known for its aerial drones and its semi-portable surveillance systems is now turning the spotlight on its undersea unmanned vehicles (UUVs).
An Extra-Large Autonomous Undersea Vehicle (XL-AUV) built by Anduril Industries just concluded a 100-hour voyage, which the company says is the longest ever for a vehicle of this class.
According to a news release earlier this month, the Dive-XL will conduct a 1,000-nautical-mile fully submerged mission in the first half of 2025.
In 2022, Anduril announced that the Royal Australian Navy had signed a $100 million contract for three Dive-XL vehicles, which are being used in its Ghost Shark program. Ghost Shark, Anduril says, is a “modular, multi-purpose capability that can flexibly respond to the Australian Defence Force’s mission requirements, creating an agile force multiplier for Defence.”
The vessel is designed for underwater intelligence gathering and long-range surveillance and can be deployed from one shipping container. That allows warfighters, according to Anduril, to launch, use, and recover the system at sea or ashore with minimal infrastructure and heavy equipment.
The company makes it clear that the US is its target market for Dive-XL.
“China already has the world’s largest navy, propelled by the world’s largest shipbuilding industry, and the United States and its allies and partners will not be able to close the gap in traditional, crewed ships and submarines on a relevant timeline to bolster deterrence in this decade,” Anduril’s press release says.
“We must build fleets of low cost, autonomous assets that deliver enhanced capability at a fraction of the cost. Anduril’s Dive-XL is a critical component of that future, and is ready to deliver at scale.”
The US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is running an undersea drone program known as Manta Ray. At this stage it involves prototypes built by Northrup Grumman and PacMar Technologies that have a resemblance to the manta ray.
The Northrop model underwent tests off the coast of southern California earlier this year.
Meanwhile, according to a report on China Central Television, China has six variants of what is described as soft-bodies submersibles that also imitate the manta ray, and they have started what is called “practical deployment” in the South China Sea.
Meanwhile, the AUKUS alliance (Australia, the UK and the US) has been developing drones, including those small enough to be launched from a submarine’s torpedo tubes. Those vessels could be used for both reconnaissance and attack missions.
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