Planners in the Navy’s vessel acquisition program made their annual pilgrimage Thursday to the International WorkBoat Show, reaching out to the U.S. shipbuilding industry – especially smaller yards – for help in fulfilling the fleet’s needs.
“We’re looking at how to be better customers,” said Capt. Gregory Mitchell, program manager at the Navy’s Program Executive Office for Unmanned and Small Combatants (PEO USC). The office oversees Navy and foreign military sales, from small combat craft and patrol boats to everyday workboats for maintaining harbors.
Specialized missions include working with marine mammals, trained to help security personnel with force protection.
In all the Navy boat program supports some 2,500 vessels in 319 locations worldwide. It’s a wildly varied array of boats that require maintenance, and ultimately replacements.
“Our user needs are very dynamic, and they’re usually imperative,” said Mitchell. "They wanted it yesterday.”
The PEO USC program maintains an outreach effort to the industry and small businesses, with frequent appearances at trade events like the International WorkBoat Show. Navy officials are planning their own small boat conference for May 2025 in Charleston, S.C.
“If we don’t have an industrial base here to support us we won’t have a fleet to deploy,” said Mitchell. He also asked shipbuilders to tell Navy planners whenever there are specifications in Navy requests that don’t make sense from a commercial shipbuilding perspective, to help improve designs.
