HD Hyundai reports that it is increasing its focus on AI systems for ship design, production and equipment control as it seeks to increase automation across its shipbuilding operations.
The company established a dedicated AI organisation within HD Korea Shipbuilding & Offshore Engineering in 2022 and reorganised it as an AIX Promotion Office reporting directly to the CEO in November 2025.
The office is working to connect AI systems deployed at individual sites and integrate AI into design and production platforms, with a focus on using industrial data to improve manufacturing productivity.
Key projects include the Shipbuilding AI Master Agent, which is being developed to connect design and production expertise across HD Hyundai Heavy Industries and HD Hyundai Samho.
The system is intended to use production video data and other information to support decision-making across design, production, quality and safety, with HD Hyundai also researching multi-agent technologies including MCP and A2A.
HD Hyundai is also applying AI directly to manufacturing equipment. Welding robots developed by HD Hyundai Robotics use vision AI to identify defects in completed welds and store inspection results as data.
The company is testing the technology at shipbuilding production sites, combining real-time images of the weld pool with robot data so that AI can detect and correct defects during the welding process.
AI is also being developed for shipyard cranes, where HD Hyundai is using digital twin simulations to model interactions between cranes, loads, wires, rigging conditions and surrounding structures.
The company is working towards an operating system that can interpret visual information from the worksite and verbal instructions from operators to generate crane operation plans.
