South Korea’s HD Hyundai Heavy Industries (HHI) and U.S. shipbuilder Huntington Ingalls Industries (HII) have signed a memorandum of agreement (MOA) to deepen cooperation in naval and commercial shipbuilding.

The agreement was signed in Gyeongju, South Korea, during the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) 2025 forum, where both nations’ senior officials and industry leaders gathered to discuss regional collaboration.

The signing was attended by Joo Won-ho, President of HHI’s Naval & Special Ship Business Unit, and Eric Chewning, Executive Vice President of Maritime Systems and Corporate Strategy at HII.

The collaboration aims to strengthen the U.S. shipbuilding industrial base by exploring distributed shipbuilding and pursuing joint construction of U.S. Navy auxiliary and commercial vessels. It also includes plans to explore joint investments in new or existing shipyards in the United States.

The agreement expands on earlier cooperation between HHI and HII and focuses on four core priorities: strengthening the U.S. shipbuilding industrial base through distributed construction, pursuing joint programmes for U.S. Navy auxiliary ships, sharing engineering and research expertise in emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence, robotics, and automation, and improving in-theatre ship lifecycle support for the U.S. Navy in the Indo-Pacific region.

Chewning said that the agreement represented the start of a deeper cooperation between the two companies and the two countries, aimed at bringing long-term change to both military and commercial shipbuilding in the United States.

Meanwhile, Joo Won-ho said that through joint participation in U.S. Navy procurement programmes and investments to establish production bases within the United States, the shipbuilding industries of both nations were taking an important step towards deeper strategic collaboration.

Earlier in October, the two companies agreed to jointly pursue the U.S. Navy’s next-generation logistics ship (NGLS) design contract. The partnership will utilise HII’s experience in complex naval construction and HHI’s expertise in auxiliary vessel design, already proven through its deliveries to the Royal New Zealand Navy and the Republic of Korea Navy.

HHI has a long record in building auxiliary vessels. It delivered the HMNZS Endeavour to New Zealand in 1987, followed by HMNZS Aotearoa in 2020. The company has also supplied the South Korean Navy with three Cheonji-class and one Soyang-class auxiliary ships.

In September, HHI began a scheduled overhaul of the USNS Alan Shepard, a 41,000-ton fleet dry cargo and ammunition ship assigned to the U.S. Navy’s 7th Fleet.

Chewning is also set to deliver a keynote address on “Strategic Collaboration Between the U.S. and Korea in Shipbuilding” at HD Hyundai’s Future Tech Forum on 27 October, part of the APEC CEO Summit Korea 2025.

In April, both companies signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) to exchange best practices for improving cost efficiency and shortening ship construction timelines, as well as to explore ways to expand U.S. shipbuilding capacity in support of national security.

As part of this ongoing cooperation, a delegation of HHI executives and technical staff visited HII’s Ingalls Shipbuilding yard in Mississippi in October to further strengthen joint efforts in upcoming shipbuilding programmes.

South Korea has also pledged to invest $150 billion in the U.S. shipbuilding sector as part of a $350 billion investment package into American industries. The investment commitment followed tariff reduction discussions held between Washington and Seoul earlier this year.

Reference: HII