Saronic buys Gulf Craft Shipyard to Fast-Track Autonomous Shipbuilding

Saronic accelerates its growth into autonomous shipbuilding with the acquisition of Gulf Craft, a Louisiana-based shipbuilder with a 60-year history of developing manned and unmanned ships for defense and commercial customers.

Through this acquisition, Saronic gains a strategically located shipyard on the Gulf Coast that will serve as the prototyping and production hub for its medium unmanned surface vessel (MUSV) fleet — starting with Marauder, Saronic’s 150-foot Autonomous Surface Vessel (ASV).

With more than60 years of experience delivering traditional manned ships and unmanned vessels for commercial and defense applications, the acquisition of Gulf Craft provides Saronic with the infrastructure and skilled workforce needed to develop, rapidly iterate, and scale production of Saronic’s MUSVs today and into the future.

“Today marks a significant milestone in Saronic’s expansion into autonomous shipbuilding and lays the foundation for our vision of our larger, next-generation shipyard, Port Alpha,” said Saronic CEO Dino Mavrookas. “We don’t wait — we build for what our customers need, when they need it. While we actively search for a home for Port Alpha, this acquisition gives us the immediate capacity to meet urgent customer needs for larger autonomous vessels and the flexibility to scale to address emerging commercial and defense