Saronic raises $1.75 billion at a $9.25 billion valuation to turn uncrewed warships into a shipbuilding business

Saronic Technologies, the Austin-based builder of autonomous surface vessels, said on March 31, 2026 that it had closed a $1.75 billion Series D round led by Kleiner Perkins at a valuation of $9.25 billion. The round more than doubles the $4 billion valuation the company carried after its Series C in February 2025.

The round

Four new investors joined, according to the company: Advent International, Bessemer Venture Partners, DFJ Growth and BAM Elevate. Existing backers 8VC, Caffeinated Capital, Andreessen Horowitz, Elad Gil and Franklin Templeton also took part. Saronic said the money will fund the development, expansion and scaled production of its autonomous surface vessels and what it called AI-driven maritime capabilities. It did not break down how the proceeds will be split between engineering and shipyard capacity, and it did not disclose revenue.

Ilya Fushman, a partner at Kleiner Perkins, framed the bet around industrial capacity rather than software alone. In the company's release he said maritime dominance requires the production capacity to field technology at scale, and that the two rarely come together.

What Saronic builds

Saronic's product line runs from the 24-foot Corsair to the 180-foot Marauder, the company said, and it intends to go "beyond" that size. The first Marauder hull was completed in less than six months, according to Saronic. The vessels operate without crews and rely on onboard autonomy software, which lets a navy put hulls to sea without putting sailors aboard.

The financing is as much about steel and welding as it is about code. Saronic said it acquired a shipyard in Louisiana and committed $300 million to a 300,000 square foot expansion there that it expects to create 1,500 jobs. It has expanded its Austin headquarters to more than 500,000 square feet, opened hubs in San Diego and Washington, D.C., and started operations in the United Kingdom and Australia. A further project, Port Alpha, is described by the company as its next-generation shipyard. When it raised its Series C, Saronic said Port Alpha would be designed from the ground up to build medium and large unmanned ships.

Track record since the last round

Saronic said that during 2025 it won a $392 million production contract from the U.S. Navy and that its headcount passed 1,300. Its Series C, announced on February 18, 2025, raised $600 million at a $4 billion valuation and was led by Elad Gil, with General Catalyst joining as a new investor. At that time the company said it had become a unicorn in July 2024 and had acquired a manufacturing facility of roughly 420,000 square feet in Austin.

Co-founder and chief executive Dino Mavrookas argued in the release that the United States has seen a steady erosion of its ability to build ships, and that Saronic's model combines first-principles engineering, advanced manufacturing and software-defined production. He said the new capital would help the company scale U.S. shipbuilding capacity on a timeline not seen since the Second World War.

Competitive context

The deal landed in a week of very large defence autonomy financings. On March 26, 2026, Shield AI, which builds AI pilot software and autonomous aircraft, said it would raise $1.5 billion in Series G equity plus $500 million of fixed-return preferred equity at a post-money valuation of $12.7 billion, led by Advent International. Advent International thus put money into both companies within six days. Anduril Industries said on May 13, 2026 that it had raised a $5 billion Series H. In uncrewed boats specifically, Providence-based HavocAI said in October 2025 that it had added $85 million, taking its total funding to about $100 million, with Lockheed Martin and Hanwha among its backers.

Why it matters

Autonomous surface vessels are one of the clearest cases of field robotics moving from prototypes to procurement. The constraint is no longer only perception and navigation software, which several rivals offer, but the ability to weld, outfit and test hulls quickly enough to meet military orders. Saronic is spending to own that bottleneck, which is why a shipyard purchase sits at the centre of a venture round.

Risks and open questions

Saronic has not published revenue, delivery numbers or the Navy contract's schedule, so investors are paying $9.25 billion largely for backlog and capacity that is still being built. Defence budgets and programme decisions can shift quickly, and a large shipyard build-out carries execution risk that pure software companies do not face. The company also did not say when Port Alpha will open or where it will be located.

What to watch

The milestones are the start of production at the expanded Louisiana yard, a site and timeline for Port Alpha, further Navy or allied orders for Marauder-class vessels, and whether the new UK and Australian operations turn into contracts with those navies.