Lockheed Martin Corporation

10/29/2025 | Press release | Distributed by Public on 10/29/2025 07:06

Lockheed Martin Invests $50M in Saildrone to Advance Unmanned Surface Vehicle Capabilities for U.S. Navy

Lockheed Martin Invests $50M in Saildrone to Advance Unmanned Surface Vehicle Capabilities for U.S. Navy

Lockheed Martin will rapidly equip Saildrone USVs with all-domain defense technology for lethal military applications.

BETHESDA, Md., Oct. 29, 2025 - Lockheed Martin (NYSE: LMT) today announced a $50 million investment in Saildrone, a global leader in maritime autonomous systems. This strategic collaboration will deliver commercially available unmanned surface vehicles (USV) equipped with lethal, combat-proven defense technology. The companies will collaborate with a goal of delivering integrations, including on-water, live fire demonstrations, in 2026.


Why it Matters

This commercial relationship marries the world's most sophisticated and trusted defense technology with the most capable and operationally tested USV technology. This combination will be key to realizing the U.S. Navy's USV vision for critical missions such as fleet defense, undersea surveillance, reconnaissance, and attack. Work will begin immediately, applying an open architecture approach along with secure command and control capability to integrate Lockheed Martin's JAGM Quad Launcher (JQL) system onto the Saildrone Surveyor platform.

Larger Saildrone vehicles are already in development to support significantly larger payloads and capabilities to include the Lockheed Martin Mk70 VLS launcher and thin line towed arrays.


Expert Perspectives

Stephanie C. Hill, president, Rotary and Mission Systems, Lockheed Martin:

"Lockheed Martin and Saildrone are leading the way to answer President Trump's call for the defense industry to act differently and leverage the strength of all of industry for our national defense. Together, we are combining the most sophisticated commercial and defense technologies to deliver a lethal naval solution at speed and scale. The nation needs this capability to maintain dominance over our adversaries, and we will deliver it."

Richard Jenkins, founder and CEO, Saildrone:

"For the last 10 years we have focused on evolving the reliability, endurance and autonomy of the Saildrone platform, which has been demonstrated in over 2 million nautical miles of active customer missions. With our technology proven, de-risked and mission ready, now is the right time to augment Saildrone USVs with sophisticated payloads to meet warfighter needs. This collaboration will give Saildrone the tools we need to transform the capabilities of our platforms, to include electronic warfare, anti-submarine warfare, sophisticated surveillance and reconnaissance, as well as deploying kinetic effects, all seamlessly integrated with Lockheed Martin's trusted command, control and fire control systems."


Additional Information

Fast Fielding of Commercial Technology for Defense: Saildrone USVs have been accomplishing complex maritime missions in the remote ocean since 2013. First deployed by the U.S. Navy in 2021, they are currently operational today, working 24/7/365 alongside American Sailors in combat theaters around the world. This commercial relationship will harness Saildrone's decade-plus of commercial expertise to quickly field new defense applications. Saildrone will maintain all shipbuilding responsibilities and Lockheed Martin will serve as lead mission integrator.

Investing Ahead of Need and Accelerating Capability: Lockheed Martin is investing in Saildrone to accelerate and de-risk deployment of urgently needed defense technologies. The investment will establish a collaborative relationship between Lockheed Martin and Saildrone systems integration teams to accelerate manufacture of new larger platforms and integrate Lockheed Martin payloads onto a variety of platforms. Lockheed Martin is also investing in its existing products to facilitate fully autonomous operations.

Ready Now: The companies are focusing on integrating ready-now, proven capabilities with Saildrone USVs to get unmatched lethality into the hands of warfighters as soon as possible.

Powering Economic Growth: Developing these transformational USVs will create jobs at Austal USA on the coast of the Gulf of America, where Saildrone's larger systems are produced. However, this work is shipyard-agnostic; as we scale, it has the potential to power economic growth at all of America's shipyards and across the wider maritime and defense industrial bases.


About Lockheed Martin

Lockheed Martin is a global defense technology company driving innovation and advancing scientific discovery. Our all-domain mission solutions and 21st Century Security® vision accelerate the delivery of transformative technologies to ensure those we serve always stay ahead of ready. More information at Lockheedmartin.com.


About Saildrone

Saildrone is a maritime defense company with a relentless passion for performance. Built to operate in the world's harshest environments, Saildrone's autonomous systems deliver payload effects and persistent, wide-area intelligence, enabling informed decisions across the spectrum of defense missions. Harnessing AI, advanced sensor suites, and renewable power for unmatched endurance at sea, Saildrone delivers superior multi-domain impact-from power projection to persistent ISR to real-time threat detection and tracking-while reducing cost and risk. With proven operational success across the world's oceans, Saildrone is advancing the frontier of autonomous maritime operations to give decision-makers and warfighters the enduring advantage to outpace adversaries today and build tomorrow's most decisive capabilities.


Forward-Looking Statements

This news release contains statements that, to the extent they are not recitations of historical fact, constitute forward-looking statements within the meaning of the federal securities laws, and are based on Lockheed Martin's current expectations and assumptions. Such forward-looking statements include, among other things, the timing of certain goals and the expected benefits of Lockheed Martin's investment in Saildrone and the commercial relationship between Lockheed Martin and Saildrone. There can be no assurance that future events will occur as anticipated, if at all, or that actual results will be as expected. These statements are not guarantees of future performance and are subject to risks and uncertainties. Actual results may differ materially due to factors such as any failure or delays in meeting specified goals; and the failure to realize benefits of Lockheed Martin's investment in Saildrone and the commercial relationship between Lockheed Martin and Saildrone. For a discussion identifying additional important factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those anticipated in the forward-looking statements, see Lockheed Martin's filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, including its most recent Annual Report on Form 10-K and subsequent quarterly reports on Form 10-Q. Lockheed Martin's SEC filings may be accessed through the Investor Relations page of its website, www.lockheedmartin.com/investor, or through the website maintained by the SEC at www.sec.gov.The forward-looking statements contained in this news release speak only as of the date hereof. Except where required by applicable law, Lockheed Martin expressly disclaims a duty to provide updates to forward-looking statements after the date of this news release to reflect subsequent events, changed circumstances, changes in expectations, or the estimates and assumptions associated with them. The forward-looking statements in this news release are intended to be subject to the safe harbor protection provided by the federal securities laws.


# # #

Media Contacts

Cailin Schmeer

[email protected]

(301) 214-3030

Jenn Virskus

[email protected]

(510) 956-8361

For further information: Media Contacts Cailin Schmeer [email protected] (301) 214-3030 Jenn Virskus [email protected] (510) 956-8361

Lockheed Martin Corporation published this content on October 29, 2025, and is solely responsible for the information contained herein. Distributed via Public Technologies (PUBT), unedited and unaltered, on October 29, 2025 at 13:07 UTC. If you believe the information included in the content is inaccurate or outdated and requires editing or removal, please contact us at [email protected]