Australia-US duo christens new unmanned undersea vessel

In a significant demonstration of the trilateral AUKUS security partnership’s Pillar II objectives, Congressman Joe Courtney has christened a new unmanned undersea surveillance vessel named Outpost TM001.

The vessel was developed by maritime technology start-up ThayerMahan and features a 22-foot (6.7 meters) hull designed and manufactured by Australia’s Ocius Technology, located in Alexandria, New South Wales.

This innovative uncrewed surface vessel harnesses the power of solar, wind, and wave energy, providing a persistent and scalable wide-area maritime surveillance capability crucial for mitigating the growing undersea threat.

The vessel is equipped with ThayerMahan’s deep-towed passive acoustic array and advanced processing technology, enabling near-real-time actionable maritime intelligence from any location worldwide. This rapid enhancement of wide-area surveillance empowers undersea warfare commanders to optimize the deployment and maximize the effectiveness of their forces.

The event, held at the SeaAirSpace 2025 Conference and Exposition, underscored the rapid advancements in anti-submarine warfare (ASW) capabilities being fostered through the collaboration between the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia.

“This creates a force multiplier for the aircraft, ships, and submarines traditionally used for the mission, and it shows how AUKUS Pillar II can leverage emerging technologies to rapidly generate naval capacity,” it was highlighted.

“The Outpost system reflects innovation writ large. It is a deployable, flexible, all-purpose platform powered by wind, solar and wave with multiple applications for civilian and military uses,” Australian Ambassador to the United States, Kevin Rudd, said.

Robert Dane, CEO and Executive Director of Ocius Technology, said the partnership with ThayerMahan represents a blending that will benefit multiple nations.

“Our focus now is to work together to deliver this capability to a number of countries around the world supporting AUKUS, but also other countries,” Dane said.