EXCLUSIVE: HII, C3 AI ink agreement to boost shipyard production using artificial intelligence

WASHINGTON — Navy shipbuilder HII and the enterprise software firm C3 AI have entered a strategic partnership focused on using artificial intelligence to improve productivity at HII’s two major shipyards, executives from both companies exclusively told Breaking Defense in an interview.

“This collaboration builds on a six-month initial program conducted at Ingalls [Shipbuilding] where teams leveraged complex algorithms to adjust and optimize work schedules and that initial deployment of the C3 AI platform demonstrated significant promise to improve schedule performance,” said Eric Chewning, a senior executive at HII. “As a result, we’re now going to scale that across the HII shipyards.”

HII’s two major shipyards, Newport News Shipbuilding in Virginia and Ingalls Shipbuilding in Pascagoula, Miss., are the prime contractors on several of the US Navy’s major shipbuilding programs, including the Ford-class aircraft carriers and San Antonio-class amphibious ships. California-based C3 AI develops enterprise-scale AI software for commercial and military use, and holds a number of contracts with the US Air Force.

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An example of where AI could help shipbuilders at a practical level, Chewning said, is balancing how each shop — individual machining stations within the shipyard — prioritize their workflow to meet the demands of different shipbuilding program schedules.

“What AI allows you to do is optimize for how the work flows through the machine shops, based on prioritization of output and how the different inputs are adjusting,” he said. “Where those activities may happen today through spreadsheets and conversations among groups of people, now you’re able to take that and have AI help schedule things dynamically.”

Thomas Siebel, chairman and CEO of C3 AI, told Breaking Defense his company is focused on
“designing, developing, provisioning [and] operating … massive scale predictive analytics applications” and that the production of complex warships is one of the most “fruitful areas” where that technology can be used.

“We can apply the latest developments in AI to reduce the time to get a job done, like build a complex machine, like a Ford-class carrier,” he said. “So, we have been working together [with HII] very closely and now have entered into a strategic alliance where … we’re going to revolutionize the fundamental foundation of the maritime industrial complex.”

The partnership comes as HII CEO Chris Kastner has stated the company’s goal is to increase shipbuilding production throughput by 20 percent in 2025.