Saronic to build Port Alpha shipyard in Texas

A computer generated image of Saronic's planned Port Alpha shipyard in Brownsville, Texas (Saronic Technologies)

Saronic Technologies has chosen Brownsville, Texas, as the site for its Port Alpha shipyard, according to a company statement on 16 July.

“The site provides hundreds of acres of waterfront access, deepwater channel connectivity, multimodal logistics infrastructure, and room for long-term expansion,” the statement said.

Saronic plans to invest more than USD3 billion to build an advanced shipyard designed for “software-defined shipbuilding and autonomous maritime systems”, the statement said.

“Advanced manufacturing, high throughput, [and] modern autonomy, this is what we're building,” Dino Mavrookas, co-founder and CEO for Saronic Technologies, told reporters during a media briefing on 15 July.

“Port Alpha will expand domestic production capacity and strengthen the nation's ability to meet commercial and defence requirements,” the statement added.

The shipyard will initially be “situated on 835 acres at the Port of Brownsville, with the opportunity to expand to nearly 4,400 acres”, the statement said.

It will include a shipyard and manufacturing facility capable of building vessels up to 850 ft in length, the statement said, noting that “future site expansion could support the production of vessels over 1,200 ft”.

The yard will “have a small handful of dry docks”, Doug Lambert, co-founder and chief operating officer for Saronic Technologies, told reporters during the briefing. “From a full life cycle perspective, Port Alpha will, to some degree, do some service work and some outfitting, and it's just natural, you're going to need them at some point,” he said.