Rear Admiral Tom Anderson, newly retired, was among the U.S. Navy members and veterans who came to Philadelphia this month as the service prepared to celebrate its 250th anniversary in the place where it was founded.

His new job: to make the city again a Navy shipbuilding center, 32 years after the old Philadelphia Navy Yard closed in the post-Cold War military cuts.

Two weeks ago the New Jersey native was hired as president of shipbuilding for Korean-owned Hanwha Defense USA to head efforts seeking Navy contracts for the Hanwha Philly Shipyard, which the Korean industrial group acquired last year.

Hanwha says it plans $5 billion in investment that would more than double employment at the former Navy yard to around 4,000 and expand production more than tenfold to 20 ships a year, including Navy and civilian vessels.

In an interview Oct. 9 — a day that Navy contractors gathered at Cherry Street Pier and heard Maritime Industrial Base leader Joshua Sturgill tell how “wars are won by manufacturing” and call for 25,000 new shipyard workers per year — Anderson addressed questions on his past and the yard’s future.

Q: Why are you joining Hanwha?

A: I’m passionate about expanding U.S. ship capability and building at scale. In the Navy, I interacted with Hanwha. They move quickly. From buying the yard to finding additional capacity, they are all in. I have joined a team that is going to significantly improve procurement.

Q: What did you learn from your time as head of shipbuilding for the troubled, multibillion-dollar Littoral Combat Ships, which the Navy is retiring from service?

A: We had two fledgling shipyards, both with foreign parents: Fincantieri and Austal. One of the big lessons was the challenge in bringing their expertise from the parent company to the U.S.

These were foreign defense contractors that needed permission from multiple governments. They were restricted in using the military expertise they had in their parent companies’ nation. And as they worked, they were faced with changing U.S. requirements.

Q: How will shipbuilding be different this time?

A: There is an understanding that we’ve gotten bogged down in the pursuit of the exquisite at the expense of the acceptable. We need to flip that and move from low-volume, high-complexity requirements to a lower-complexity, higher-volume model.

You can’t keep stopping and making major changes as you build ships, if you want (faster production).

The big shipbuilders around the world — the model in China, Korea and Japan — they are commercial shipbuilders who also do some building for their navies. In the U.S., we have that upside down. The Navy is going it alone with a little help from commercial yards.

I was really excited about the SHIPS for America Act making its way through Congress. It is an attempt to get us in a better place with regard to commercial shipbuilding (through federal subsidies and incentives, and restrictions on foreign vessels).

Hanwha is a commercial shipbuilder. They don’t have the limitations of working only in defense products. So they are bringing the workforce in Philadelphia up to speed on design, workforce, and infrastructure and leveraging the knowledge they have gained building so many ships in Korea.

Q: How much work is there for U.S. shipyards?

A: If you look at what the Navy, the Coast Guard, and the (federal civilian) Maritime Administration wants to build, it exceeds the capacity of all the (U.S.) shipyards. They will have significant work for years.

Q: How will you find more workers?

A: There’s a real shortage across the nation of blue-collar workforce. During COVID, many senior people retired. Now the Navy through the Maritime Industrial Base Program is working to set up training centers. You may see submarines on TV getting folks interested in blue-collar jobs.

I don’t think we’re over the hump. We have more jobs than people to fill them.

Q: With new technology, will you need fewer people?

A: Philly is leveraging their knowhow from Korea with systems they use that are very efficient. Less human labor is required because they have machines that do really good work. They have an excellent training curriculum; you’ve seen people coming in and getting up to speed. People see it’s safe, and you can move up. We lost that pride in working in this industry, but we’re on the uptick.

Q: Who will manage the shipbuilding?

A: In Philadelphia, for the ships built for the Maritime Administration (starting in 2020), there was this utilization of a VCM — a vessel construction manager, a third party (Tote Services), to oversee construction of a ship. They understand commercial standards and that allows very efficient construction. There’s a movement in Congress to move to VCMs. For us in Philly that’s a good thing.

Q: How fast can ships be built?

A: When I visited (Hanwha’s Okpo shipyard), they were delivering 40 ships a year — a scale we don’t understand in the United States. We have done it before. Hopefully we get back to a place where we do it again. Philly its a place where we plan to do it in significant numbers.

Q: What’s the future of Philadelphia’s Navy Yard?

A: I love that we are bringing back shipbuilding in a major way to Philly. There are remnants from when it was a hustling bustling Navy Yard. To go there and see all that’s going on and how big it will be, I’m excited to watch it expand.

It’s completely and totally appropriate the Navy is being celebrated in a big way here. There will be a significant permanent Navy presence again. You’ll have more work on the waterfront, and sailors walking the streets.

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