Huntington Ingalls Industries (HII) and HD Hyundai Heavy Industries (HHI) have signed a new agreement to cooperate on commercial and defense shipbuilding, expanding overall US naval production capacity.
The deal, signed at the APEC 2025 summit in Gyeongju, South Korea, emphasizes distributed production models and potential joint investments.
Both companies will jointly target US Navy auxiliary ship programs by combining HII’s naval construction expertise with HHI’s large-scale vessel experience. Their collaboration also covers research, automation, robotics, and AI-driven shipyard technologies.
Additionally, the firms plan to coordinate lifecycle support for US Navy vessels operating in the Indo-Pacific to enhance repair and sustainment infrastructure.
This partnership builds on prior agreements, including their joint pursuit of the US Navy’s Next-Generation Logistics Ship (NGLS) design. Earlier deals in April included sharing shipbuilding best practices to cut costs and accelerate timelines, with HHI also offering to produce Aegis destroyers for the US.
