It was just past the midwatch when the guided-missile frigate USS Pleiades (FFX-2001) slipped through the dark waters of the contested strait, her wake vanishing into the swells as if reluctant to betray her passage. Her silhouette was all but invisible, shaped to confound the curious gaze of radar and satellite alike. She had been guided to her current position by a combination of experienced seamanship and complex algorithms that had designed a track to minimize chances of detection by the enemy. The crew, seasoned in their duties, moved with quiet intensity. Below decks, the hum of her power plant—a marvel of nuclear and battery technology—hummed steadily and silently to provide the steady flow of power to ship’s systems and ready to provide pulsed energy for the ship’s weapons battery. Like the famous frigates built in 1799, the USS Pleiades was built to fight, with a hull that combined speed, strength, space, and power to accommodate dynamic weapon loads and data microprocessors to adapt to the changing threats.
The captain stood on the bridge, hands clasped loosely behind his back, his sharp eyes scanning the horizon. The air was thick with anticipation, though no sound betrayed it. Pleiades had been built for moments such as this, in which stealth, precision, and adaptability could turn the tide of a campaign. He felt a surge of pride knowing he commanded a vessel and crew that represented the peak of his nation’s naval ingenuity.
“TAO, report,” he said, his voice cutting through the low murmur of activity.
The TAO responded into her headset, tablet in hand, her tone crisp. “All systems green, Captain. Surveillance drone swarm detected at 30 nautical miles—autonomous defensive protocols standing by. I've verified that we uploaded the latest tactical algorithms to counteract their swarm dispersal patterns. ArleighAI has analyzed the situation and provided three attack options.”
The captain replied, “Very well. Maintain course and speed. Those drones don’t have a very long range, so keep a sharp search for the launch vessel.”
”Aye, sir,” the TAO responded.
The Pleiades moved with quiet purpose, her systems updating in real time. A U.S. submarine had covertly observed this type of drone swarm just 48 hours earlier. That information was sent back to fleet headquarters and warfare centers for analysis: statistical validation that this was authentic information, not a deception. The analysts and coders determined what type of signals the drones used and how to defeat the swarm. The Pleiades downloaded a software update with the latest countermeasures—enhanced by the on-board artificial intelligence agent, ArleighAI. Below decks, in the combat information center, the crew monitored the swarm’s approach and the faint signature of an enemy ship believed to be its launching platform.
The enemy was testing the swarm—a formidable weapon designed to overwhelm defenses with sheer numbers—but the Pleiades was prepared.
Designing And Building Future Warships
Ships like the Pleiades could be built today. The story above sets the stage for a discussion of warship design processes and an acquisition system that could conceive of, acquire, and support such ships.
The design and acquisition of the Pleiades centers around an approach that integrates three distinct technology streams—software, systems, and structures—that move at different speeds. These three streams update and operate separately, advancing at their maximum individual rates but integrating and harmonizing with each other in the end.
Stream 1. Software: Learning at the Speed of Operations
Software is the warship’s brain, enabling it to adapt rapidly to shifting threats and operational needs. The Pleiades’ modular and open software architecture allows for real-time updates without disrupting operations, ensuring the ship remains effective in quickly evolving environments. Software development, security, and operations (DevSecOps)—a process of continual development, delivery, and feedback—allows a warship to improve its capabilities while at sea. By collecting data from its sensors, combat systems, and onboard operations, the ship generates a wealth of actionable insights that are analyzed on board and transmitted to development teams ashore to rapidly create and test software patches and enhancements. Once validated, these updates are pushed back to the ship and to the rest of the fleet.
Prior to the Pleiades’ operation in the contested strait, a U.S. submarine had encountered new drone swarm behavior not accounted for in its tactical algorithms. The submarine’s systems recorded and analyzed the interaction, identifying patterns and vulnerabilities in the swarm’s dispersal. The submarine sent this information to the fleet and warfare system commands, where the data was validated and analyzed. A new software patch was quickly developed, tested in a simulated environment, and deployed to the fleet by secure datalink. Within hours, the ship’s defenses were optimized, turning a moment of learning into an operational advantage. This update was also sent to the rest of the fleet, which operates on a common version of the combat system.
This ability to evolve dynamically ensures the Pleiades adapts to the battlespace. By embedding DevSecOps into its software lifecycle, the warship—and indeed the entire Navy—becomes a living system, capable of learning and growing with every mission performed by every platform.
Stream 2. Systems: Refreshing at the Speed of Technology
The ship’s systems architecture is the vital bridge between the fast-paced evolution of software and the enduring nature of structural components. At the core of this stream lies Moore’s Law—the doubling of microprocessor power every couple of years. This rapid progression fuels advances in warfighting ability through updates to computing, sensors, and weapon systems. With this in mind, it is imperative for warships to update their systems rapidly.
The Pleiades’ systems are designed with scalability and modularity in mind, allowing hardware components to be upgraded or replaced as new technologies emerge. Standardized interfaces and plug-and-play components ensure that advancements in computing power, energy efficiency, and miniaturization can be integrated quickly, with minimal disruption to the full system. By designing for quick updates, and employing experienced, dedicated teams for installation, the ship’s systems can be updated in a few days.
Stream 3. Structure: Hull and Power Plant Built
to Go the Distance
The hull and power plant are the most enduring aspects of a warship, requiring designs that anticipate future technologies. The Pleiades’ stealthy hull and hybrid power plant are products of advanced computational modeling and material science, ensuring hydrodynamic efficiency, survivability, and the ability to support high-energy systems such as directed-energy weapons. Warship power and cooling margins must be ready to accommodate significant increases in electrical demand from new generations of weapons and data centers that support AI, so she was built with plenty of space, weight, and power (SWAP) for growth. In terms of sustainment, Pleiades is capable of organic repair through on-board additive manufacturing of components and parts. With space and power reserves for future upgrades, her structural design provides high performance and enables rapid system and software updates to guarantee combat superiority over her lifetime.
Buying and Supporting In Three Streams
Having designed Pleiades using a “three-stream” approach, acquiring and supporting the ship requires the defense acquisition community to evolve and embrace a modular approach to achieve speed, flexibility, and collaboration. Despite some progress at the edges, most traditional defense acquisition is still fundamentally tuned to the slowest stream—providing structures. The system must accommodate the radically different speeds of procuring, testing, deploying, and supporting software and systems. Three separate and harmonized systems emerge.
This approach will allow for the ship’s components—software, systems, and structures—to be developed and updated independently and at an appropriate pace for each. The processes for buying and supporting software and systems are fundamentally different than those for buying platforms. Defense acquisition system oversight can ensure these three separate streams, proceeding at different speeds, stay harmonized with one another when they all converge on product delivery and sustainment.
Stream 1. Software: Learning from the Tech Titans
Software development for warships must follow the rapid, iterative, and scalable approaches the technology giants employ. These companies use DevSecOps pipelines, accelerated by automatic test and retest against operational performance goals, to ensure continuous integration and delivery, enabling their platforms to evolve in real time.
For warships, this means designing software that can be updated during deployments without interrupting operations. Like a cloud service provider updating millions of user systems seamlessly, the Navy could use modular architectures and automated testing to ensure secure, reliable updates. Imagine the Pleiades as a living organism in a connected colony, adapting to emerging threats by deploying the latest algorithms, much like how tech companies push updates to millions of devices overnight.
Stream 2. Systems: Emulating Advanced Manufacturers
The systems architecture of a warship benefits from the strategies employed by companies that excel in hardware integration and scalability. These firms design their platforms with modularity in mind, enabling rapid upgrades as new technologies become available. Products are designed and built with standardized interfaces that allow components to be swapped quickly for advanced versions without redesigning the entire platform. This effect becomes even more powerful as intelligence is pushed farther to the edges of the system, doing more computational work in a distributed way, as soon as possible.
Similarly, the Pleiades’ systems architecture is adaptable, with standardized interfaces and plug-and-play components that facilitate integration of new processors, sensors, and weapons. This ensures the ship can ride the exponential curve of microprocessor improvements as fast as possible—without the need for lengthy refits.
Stream 3. Structures: Taking Inspiration from Infrastructure Leaders
The long lifecycle of a warship’s hull and power plant aligns closely with industries such as civil engineering and shipbuilding. In this stream, the best firms are masters of creating structures built to last, yet flexible enough to accommodate upgrades. They achieve this by using advanced materials and modular designs, ensuring durability while leaving room—SWAP—for future adaptation.
For the Pleiades, this means a hull and power plant designed with the foresight to support the weapons and systems of the future. Advanced materials, computational fluid dynamics, and virtual modeling—techniques industry leaders already use—would enable the Navy to build ships that balance longevity with adaptability.
A Unified Model for Acquisition
By adopting a three-stream acquisition system focused on software, systems, and structures—learning from and partnering with leading companies in these areas—the defense acquisition community can overcome the challenges of designing, building, testing, delivering, and supporting the three streams involved. And while the Department of Defense (DoD) must learn from the best in business, the risk profile for DoD is much different than for business. Information and supply-chain security is a different challenge for DoD, which cannot permit vulnerabilities that put combat forces at risk. One significant vulnerability that emerges at the core of the system is the Achilles’ heel associated with the harmonization function—where one fault potentially could affect the entire integrated system.
To mitigate this risk, the acquisition and operational systems must incorporate modularity in a way that would allow problems to be isolated and confined to minimize their affect on the integrated system as a whole.1 So the three-stream modular approach would not only ensure each element of the warship would be developed and maintained at the maximum pace of each stream, but also ensure that problems could be limited. In this way, the ship could evolve and remain combat-ready across decades of service.
Recommended Actions
The Pleiades exemplifies what could be achieved when software, systems, and structures develop at their resonant pace, in harmony with one another, using cutting-edge practices and lessons of the commercial world. To realize this vision, naval architects and the acquisition community must embrace significant structural changes and learn to think and behave in three streams.
For Naval Architects and Shipbuilders
Define Interface Standards to Adopt Modular and Open Architectures
Naval architects must prioritize open standards and modularity in every aspect of ship design, with a strict emphasis on software and hardware interfaces. It is insufficient to design a system that cannot update software in minutes or systems in days. The Navy must do better—and the best companies are already doing this. By designing and demanding standard interfaces (e.g., application programming interfaces, plug-and-play hardware interfaces), the system would allow more open competition and rapid capability improvement, as long as upgrades comply with the universal interface requirements.
Integrate Advanced Testing Early and Continue Through the Ship’s Lifetime
Virtual modeling and digital twin technologies must be embedded in the design process from the start. These tools allow architects to simulate, test, and retest every aspect of a ship’s performance—operational software running on prototypic hardware, structural integrity, energy usage, and sensor effectiveness—before construction begins and throughout the building and integration process until delivery. And the benefits continue during the ship’s operational life. Integrating these technologies could identify design flaws early, ensuring ships meet mission requirements without costly mid-build changes.
Build in Power, Cooling, and Space Margins
Ships must be designed with significant reserves in power generation and physical space to accommodate future technologies such as directed-energy weapons, advanced sensors, or AI-driven systems. Naval architects should think of warships as dynamic platforms rather than static tools, building in flexibility to meet the unknown needs of the future.
For the Defense Acquisition Community
The acquisition community must move beyond traditional in-house practices and adopt proven business methods by partnering with the private sector and academia. This includes embracing DevSecOps for software development (Stream 1) and just-in-time manufacturing for hardware production (Stream 2). For example, Stream 1 requires treating software development as a continual process rather than a one-time deliverable.
Improve Accountability by Aligning Leadership Rotations with Program Milestones
A key weakness of current defense acquisition practices is the independence of leadership rotations from program timelines. Senior leaders are often reassigned before a shipbuilding program reaches critical milestones, reducing accountability and fragmenting oversight. Instead, leadership tenure, responsibility, authority, and accountability should align with program milestones, ensuring leaders become experts at their jobs and see projects through critical phases of design, construction, and delivery. This alignment would enhance accountability and foster a sense of ownership over performance, schedule, and cost. The historic examples of Naval Reactors, the AEGIS Program, and Strategic Systems Program are informative here.
Foster Accountability Through Metrics and Transparency
Related to the above recommendation, the acquisition community must adopt a business-practice approach to establish clear performance metrics tied to cost, schedule, and operational outcomes. These metrics should be available on demand with authoritative data in real time, publicly reported within DoD to ensure transparency and accountability. When combined with aligned leadership rotations, this approach would reinforce a culture of delivering results on time and within budget.
Prioritize Agile Testing and Evaluation
Testing should no longer be a bottleneck that occurs only at the end of development. Instead, adopt an automatic and iterative approach to test, retest, and evaluate, incorporating continuous feedback loops to identify and amplify issues early. Agile testing methodologies, modeled on commercial practices, allow for faster deployment of capabilities while maintaining reliability and performance. This approach should continue throughout a ship’s lifetime, allowing for persistent monitoring of performance as the ship improves through frequent software and system updates.
Overhaul Contracting Practices
The current contracting system is byzantine and arcane. This complexity means contracts take too much time and energy to get to signature, and once a contract is signed, allows for too much behavior that is not aligned with the Navy’s goals of competing with potential enemies. The years required to get to a program of record is a barrier to moving capability to the fleet ahead of adversaries—most startup companies simply cannot endure such a long runway. DoD should be able to contract with firms that offer clear improvements at the pace of the stream in which they are working. Any contract awards must be reassessed frequently to ensure the Navy is getting the performance it needs (and contracted for) and allow for continuing competition by other firms. Here again, the best business practices should be used as a model. Contracts for streams 1, 2, and 3 would have different structures.
Transition to Predictive Maintenance
Traditional maintenance practices rely heavily on fixed schedules or reactive repairs, leading to inefficiencies and unexpected downtimes. By using predictive analytics and digital twins, the Navy can anticipate maintenance needs before failures occur. This approach—already common in the commercial aviation industry—would reduce costs and manpower requirements and ensure warships remain mission-ready for longer periods.
Create Lifelong Partnerships with Industry
The partnerships the Navy builds to design and deliver ships must be long-term and continue throughout a ship’s lifetime to ensure ongoing collaboration on maintenance, software updates, and system upgrades. These partnerships should be structured around lifecycle sustainment rather than one-off contracts, enabling a seamless transition from initial construction to in-service support.
We Can Do This Now
Transforming warship design and acquisition requires bold steps and a commitment to embrace new ways of thinking. Naval architects must focus on creating adaptable platforms, while the acquisition community must adopt practices that prioritize flexibility, accountability, and collaboration.
By incorporating commercial business practices, aligning leadership rotations with program milestones, and embedding continual testing and support processes, DoD can deliver warships like the Pleiades—ships that not only dominate the battlespace when built but also remain at the cutting edge for decades to come. Ultimately, the Pleiades represents not just a ship but a philosophy—an embodiment of agility, resilience, and technological foresight. This vision challenges traditional approaches, pushing naval architects and the defense acquisition community to think differently. Most of these measures will save money and time. By embracing these principles, the Navy can deliver a fleet that dominates the battles of today while preparing for the challenges of tomorrow.
“Engage swarm defenses,” the captain orders.
The ship’s directed-energy weapons come to life. Invisible beams of coherent light lance through the night, intercepting the drones with unerring precision. Each strike sends a micro-drone plummeting into the sea, its circuits fried. Simultaneously, the Pleiades’ electronic warfare suite disrupts the swarm’s control signals, scattering the remaining drones into chaos. In less than three minutes, the swarm is neutralized.
But the work is not done. The enemy ship that had launched the swarm is now within range, attempting to retreat behind a screen of radar jamming. The TAO breaks the tense silence. “Enemy vessel detected at 55 nautical miles. Multiple jamming signals—active electronic countermeasures in place. Captain, this is likely the swarm launch platform. Suggest countertargeting protocols.”
The captain gives a tight nod. “Countertargeting protocols online. Ready missiles and fire-control systems.”
The Pleiades’s sensors, enhanced by her recently upgraded processors, penetrate the jamming with precision. The enemy ship’s silhouette emerges on the tactical display—a frigate, bristling with weapons but unable to hide from the Pleiades’ advanced targeting systems.
“Target locked,” the TAO reports.
“Launch.”
The Pleiades unleashes a salvo of antiship missiles, each one guided by the ship’s advanced targeting algorithms. The first missile strikes the enemy frigate’s propulsion system. The second detonates amidships, igniting secondary explosions as the magazines ignite. The enemy ship is aflame, sinking rapidly into the depths.
The Pleiades has proven her worth—not only as a defender but as a hunter. She has neutralized the swarm and eliminated its source with precision—her software, systems, and structure working in harmony.
1. For more on this thinking, see Wiring the Winning Organization by Gene Kim and Steve Spear (IT Revolution Press, 2023).