A successful Australian naval shipbuilding program needs digital foundations

The shipbuilding and sustainment technologies are largely available today; the challenge now is organisational implementation and change management, writes Simon Crook, Solution Specialist, SSI

Modernising vessel sustainment practices through digital solutions is critical to ensuring the operational readiness, efficiency, and affordability of Australia’s naval fleet.

Modern navies world-wide are increasingly turning to digital transformation initiatives to enhance availability of assets and efficiency over their operational lifecycle. The ease with which a ship can be maintained and upgraded is largely determined by the quality of the digital information created and maintained about that ship.

Naval programs have become so complex and expensive, both to build and to maintain, that new sustainment approaches are needed to maximise availability of digital information.

Key challenges facing Australia’s shipbuilding and defence sustainment sectors include fragmented data systems, a significant increase in newbuilds, and plans for extensive mid-lifecycle upgrades on upcoming vessels.

Lessons learned from both Australian and international naval programs that leverage model-based sustainment and digital twin technologies to improve asset availability indicate that shipbuilding-specific Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) systems can significantly enhance asset management.

Integrating engineering, procurement, construction, and In-Service Support (ISS) through a unified digital environment creates an accessible digital thread and accurate digital twins for both new-build programs, such as Australia’s Hunter-class frigates and AUKUS submarines, and legacy vessels like the Anzac-class frigates.

This facilitates streamlined Maintenance, Repair, and Operations (MRO) by capturing intelligent data, precisely managing configurations, and improving information sharing across industry stakeholders and the Royal Australian Navy.

Establishing a centralised, shipbuilding-focused PLM platform to consolidate and unify disparate data, can provide a single authoritative source of truth for asset conditions, configuration changes and maintenance planning. They will also position Australian shipbuilders to meet the increasingly complex defence demands of the 21st century and beyond.

Embedding PLM

Implementing an integrated PLM approach across an entire enterprise is not trivial – it requires not only new technology, but also alignment of processes, standards, and even contract policies. One best practice is to insist on open standards and interoperability from the beginning.

Naval programs should favour PLM and related tools that are built on open architectures or at least support standard data exchange formats, to avoid vendor lock-in and ensure longevity of data. This approach guarantees that as technology evolves, the digital thread can be transferred or upgraded without losing information.

Another critical factor is data governance: stakeholders must establish clear rules for data ownership, update responsibilities, and validation procedures among the Navy, shipbuilders, and OEMs. In an integrated model, one must define who is responsible for maintaining which portions of the single source of truth at any given time.

Australia’s Plan Galileo and the recent Surface Ship Sustainment initiatives similarly emphasise standardising data and interfaces as part of building a national continuous sustainment enterprise. Going forward, we can expect to see explicit contract language that enforces integrated data environments.

The U.S. Navy’s move toward contractual Model-Based Product Support (MBPS) requirements is a case in point – future shipbuilding contracts stipulate that industry must populate the government’s chosen digital environment with all the requisite sustainment data as a condition of delivery.

This makes the integrated digital thread a contractual deliverable of the program, alongside the ship itself. The implication for shipbuilders and software providers is significant: solutions must be able to deliver data to the customer in the required format and fidelity, and all parties must collaborate closely throughout the build to ensure the digital twin is fully realised at handover.

The roadmap for model-based sustainment points toward deeper integration, more open collaboration, and a lifecycle view enshrined in both technology and policy. Navies that invest in these areas will be well positioned to handle the increasing pace of technological change and the growing complexity of future fleets.

The Australian Context

For Australian naval shipbuilding and sustainment, the challenge is clear. The upcoming planned A$123bn-$159bn investment in maritime capability across submarine, surface, and army littoral crafts will push existing sustainment systems to a potential breaking point.

This is augmented by the introduction of new platforms like the Hunter-class frigates and AUKUS submarines, alongside ongoing life-extension projects for existing vessels. Traditional, siloed approaches will not be sufficient.

The opportunity to adopt model-based sustainment through a common, shipbuilding-focused platform will consolidate and connect data across all phases of the ship’s life and across designers, shipbuilders, the Royal Australian Navy and other suppliers.

This will provide the single source of truth needed to manage asset condition, configuration changes, and maintenance planning efficiently at fleet scale.

Learning Lessons

An integrated, model-based sustainment approach supported by digital twins, modern PLM systems, and advanced analytics stands out as a transformative solution for naval asset management.

It aligns closely with the strategic modernization priorities of many navies, including Australia’s vision of considering sustainment from day one of design, the Royal Navy’s push for data-driven decision-making, the RCN’s initiatives in digital twins and AI-driven maintenance and the US Navy’s drive to embed digital requirements into new ship contracts.

By learning from each other’s efforts and investing in a unified digital thread infrastructure, these naval enterprises can significantly improve asset availability, operational readiness, and lifecycle affordability.

For Australia in particular, the lessons are clear. The impending introduction of advanced platforms like the Hunter-class frigates and AUKUS submarines, alongside ongoing life-extension projects for existing vessels, will place heavy demands on the sustainment system. Fragmented methods will fall short.

The opportunity is to establish a centralised, shipbuilding-focused PLM backbone that consolidates and connects data across all phases of the ship’s life. This approach creates one authoritative dataset for asset condition, configuration control, and maintenance planning across the fleet. The long-term success of Australian shipbuilding programs (in both performance and cost) will heavily depend on the strength of its digital foundation.

The digital shipbuilding and sustainment technologies to enable this are largely available today; the challenge now is organisational implementation and change management. As navies continue this path, we can expect future warships to be not only more advanced in capability, but also far better supported by a responsive, data-rich sustainment system that keeps them ready for whatever mission is required.

Embracing model-based sustainment is thus a strategic investment in through-life capability, ensuring that naval forces can meet operational demands effectively and affordably for decades to come.