CANFIELD, Ohio — Matt Sermon, Direct Reporting Program Manager for the Navy’s Maritime Industrial Base (MIB) Program, delivered a keynote address at America Makes' 13th Annual Members Meeting & Exchange (MMX) on Aug. 6, emphasizing the urgent need to scale advanced manufacturing capabilities across the U.S. defense industrial base.
The two-day summit brought together leaders from government, industry, and academia to accelerate additive manufacturing innovation, strengthen supply chains, and grow the skilled workforce needed for 21st-century defense readiness.
Sermon’s keynote highlighted how advanced manufacturing is not just improving shipbuilding processes — it’s transforming what’s possible in terms of speed, quality, and national defense readiness.
“This is an all-hands-on-deck moment, and I mean that in the most exciting way possible,” Sermon said. “We’re not just building ships. We’re building the future of American manufacturing, and we need the best minds across industry, government, and the workforce to help us get there.”
He emphasized that this future is already taking shape, driven by rapid advances in technology and a renewed national focus on domestic manufacturing.
“We’re at a pivotal moment where advanced manufacturing isn’t just improving how we build ships,” Sermon told the audience of AM professionals. “It’s fundamentally changing what’s possible in terms of speed, quality, and capacity. The technologies we’re implementing today will support America’s maritime strength for the next 50 years.”
The MIB Program is the Navy’s most comprehensive initiative to rebuild America’s shipbuilding capacity since the Cold War. Through coordinated investments in advanced manufacturing, workforce development, and supply chain expansion, the program addresses critical production gaps while building long-term industrial resilience.
Additive manufacturing is central to that transformation.
Since 2018, the Navy has launched nearly 1,200 supplier development and advanced manufacturing projects across 40 states. These projects are expanding domestic production capacity, reducing part delays, and enabling new capabilities at shipyards and repair facilities.
The Navy’s Additive Manufacturing Center of Excellence in Danville, Virginia, is a prime example. When the USS Halsey required a helicopter hangar door bracket, traditional procurement timelines estimated a 40-week delay. The Danville team produced the part in 19 days, keeping a billion-dollar destroyer on mission.
Another submarine component that could have stalled production for months was manufactured in just nine days. The Danville facility is continuing to partner with industry to mitigate more than 1,000 days of delay across the fleet.
The MIB Program is also targeting nine material and build process combinations to develop additive manufacturing specifications for more than 75 percent of long lead-time submarine components. These efforts are especially important for sectors like castings, forgings and fittings, where traditional suppliers have struggled to meet growing Navy new construction and sustainment demand.
“Foundational investments like these take time to mature,” Sermon said. “We are planting trees, not growing houseplants. Since 2018, we are expanding parts delivery for submarines by more than 250 percent, and this production must more than double again to deliver the nuclear Navy that the nation needs. We can get this done.”
This transformation spans the entire maritime industrial base. Beyond additive manufacturing, the MIB Program’s portfolio includes automation, robotics, digital inspection and artificial intelligence. More than 70 automation and robotics projects are currently underway across the maritime supply chain.
At Newport News Shipbuilding, collaborative robots have demonstrated improved welding efficiency and first-pass quality. AI-driven quality control systems are reducing inspection times while creating new specializations for skilled technicians.
The Navy’s approach to non-destructive testing shows how these technologies are improving readiness. At Norfolk Naval Shipyard, digital radiography systems have advanced inspection time and reduced processing costs. Robotic inspection capability was deployed on the USS Washington this summer to help expedite achieving faster inspection timelines. AI models trained for radiographic testing are achieving accuracy on par with human inspectors; this will be used to supplement the NDT workforce and training.
But as Sermon emphasized, technology alone isn’t enough.
“You can build out all the additive manufacturing capability in the world, but if you don’t have the people to run it, maintain it, and grow with it, then it doesn’t matter,” Sermon said. “This is about building a workforce that sees a future in this mission, where a welding job today can lead to an engineering career tomorrow. That’s how we sustain this effort and make it real.”
He stressed that the opportunity ahead isn’t just about filling roles, it’s about inspiring people to join a generational effort.
“We’re not just offering jobs. We’re offering the chance to be part of something truly historic. Workers aren’t just learning to operate machines. They’re learning to operate the technologies that will define the next generation of American manufacturing excellence.”
The Navy estimates that the maritime industrial base will require 250,000 new skilled workers over the next decade. In 2024 alone, regional talent pipeline programs helped recruit, train, hire, and retain more than 12,600 new employees for the defense industrial base.
This integration of workforce and manufacturing capability is visible in Danville, where the Additive Manufacturing Center of Excellence operates adjacent to the Accelerated Training in Defense Manufacturing program. That proximity allows students to train on the same systems that are printing real Navy components, creating both speed to skill and speed to fleet.
“The summit reinforced just how urgent this moment is,” Sermon said. “We need to bring cutting-edge manufacturing closer to where it’s needed — at every shipyard, every repair facility, and every production node across the industrial base.”
The summit included industry perspectives and presentations from the Defense Innovation Unit and Department of Defense manufacturing programs. Attendees explored how to replicate additive manufacturing successes across the broader defense ecosystem.
Matthew Sermon, Direct Reporting Program Manager, Maritime Industrial Base Program, delivers a keynote address at America Makes' 13th Annual Members Meeting & Exchange (MMX) on Aug. 6. Courtesy Photo by Rhys Sampson, America Makes.
“This event demonstrates the power of collaboration between government and industry,” Sermon said. “When we bring together the best minds in additive manufacturing with the urgent needs of national defense, we create solutions that seemed impossible just a few years ago.”
The 2025 MMX Summit demonstrated that additive manufacturing is more than a capability — it’s a cornerstone of modern defense readiness. As the Navy modernizes for an era of global competition, scaling these technologies is essential to maintaining maritime dominance, industrial resilience, and national security.
| Date Taken: | 08.07.2025 |
| Date Posted: | 09.02.2025 14:13 |
| Story ID: | 547028 |
| Location: | CANFIELD, OHIO, US |
| Web Views: | 37 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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