Defense technology giant Anduril Industries has quietly vacated its maritime operations along Seattle’s Lake Washington Ship Canal.
The exit, confirmed by the company to GeekWire this week, comes after the U.S. Navy canceled the specific autonomous vessel acquisition program Anduril was pursuing at the historic former Foss Maritime shipyard site.
“Anduril has moved out of its shipyard space in Seattle,” a spokesperson said in a statement. “The space supported a Navy program pursuit; the Navy canceled that program, and the shipyard footprint was no longer needed. The Seattle shipyard presence was always small — a handful of employees worked from the space. Anduril’s broader Seattle footprint continues to grow across its other offices in the city.”
The disclosure provides a sudden plot twist in a maritime push that GeekWire first reported on in April, after Anduril established a presence at the Foss shipyard. At the time, the company offered a muted response when pressed for specifics about its local shipyard activities.
The plans went back to late 2025, when Anduril announced a major partnership with South Korea’s HD Hyundai Heavy Industries.
The companies set out to build a new class of dual-use Autonomous Surface Vessels designed to compete for the Navy’s Modular Attack Surface Craft (MASC) program, which sought unmanned vessels capable of carrying large payloads over long distances.
At the time, Anduril pitched the Pacific Northwest as the ideal industrial launchpad, pointing to the region’s historic shipbuilding roots.
“Anduril has invested tens of millions of dollars to revamp a previously retired shipyard in the Pacific Northwest region at the historic former Foss Shipyard in Seattle, Washington,” the company said during the partnership rollout. “This facility will serve as Anduril’s initial U.S. hub for low-rate vessel assembly, integration, and testing of ASVs for the MASC program.”
That vision, however, was quickly upended. The U.S. Navy canceled the MASC initiative in March, replacing it with a new acquisition strategy for Medium Unmanned Surface Vessels, or MUSVs.
Rather than relying on a traditional program competition, the new marketplace allows the Navy to evaluate autonomous vessels through at-sea demonstrations, with successful systems eligible for follow-on production.
When the Department of the Navy announced the seven defense vendors selected to move forward in the new program, the lineup included defense contractors like Leidos, Huntington Ingalls Industries, Saronic Technologies and Sea Machines — leaving Anduril off the roster for initial testing.
Companies that successfully deploy vessels at sea will receive $15 million, and be eligible for follow-on production. At-sea testing was set to start in June, and is expected to conclude in October.
Anduril did not respond to additional questions about the Foss facility, its maritime operations in the Seattle area or its plans for the Navy’s new MUSV program.
Despite vacating its shipyard presence, Anduril’s broader push into Western Washington remains on a steep upward trajectory. The Costa Mesa, Calif.-based company employs 560 people across its Bellevue and downtown Seattle offices — up from roughly 30 four years ago — and operates a multi-acre military testing facility in rural Carnation, Wash.
The high-flying defense giant, which closed a $5 billion funding round at a $61 billion valuation earlier this year and is reportedly targeting a $100 billion valuation in a new funding round, is rapidly building a massive engineering footprint in the greater Seattle region.
Senior Vice President Tom Keane told GeekWire the company could eventually grow its regional workforce to 1,000 people, including engineers working on augmented reality displays, edge computing hardware and other military technologies.
Anduril’s rapid expansion in the region is the subject of a separate profile story today on GeekWire.