Developed with General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, Inc. and Mercury Marine, MRLN enables Ghostworks’ M-Hull and powercat vessels to perform multiple missions from a single platform, without trading off speed, range, or payload.
CARLISLE, PA — July 14, 2026 — At the 2026 Pennsylvania Defense and Innovation Summit, hosted by U.S. Senator Dave McCormick at the U.S. Army War College, Ghostworks today unveiled MRLN (Multirole Remote Littoral Node), a remote-pilot autonomy system that equips a single vessel to take on multiple mission types under human-in-the-loop command and control. MRLN is not a vessel; it is the mission systems layer that deploys across Ghostworks’ proprietary M-Hull and powercat hull forms, turning each vessel into a multirole platform.
Minerva, Ghostworks’ 40-foot carbon fiber M-Hull, under way. Minerva carries MRLN, the Multirole Remote Logistics Node, a remote-pilot autonomy system developed with General Atomics Aeronautical Systems and Mercury Marine and unveiled July 14 at the 2026 Pennsylvania Defense and Innovation Summit.
MRLN was developed with three partners, each contributing a core piece of the system:
- Ghostworks designed, engineered, and built a 40′ carbon fiber Minerva-class M-Hull, with speed, range, and payload currently unrivaled in the industry.
- General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, Inc. (GA-ASI) brought decades of autonomy and sensor experience from remotely piloted aircraft and adapted it to the maritime domain.
- Mercury Marine contributed its drive-by-wire propulsion technology and Command Gateway product, giving MRLN the endurance to transit contested and congested environments and to maintain station for extended periods in demanding conditions.
Command of the iron triangle: the long-standing tradeoff between speed, range, and payload has quietly dictated naval procurement for a generation. Rather than optimizing for one at the expense of the others, Ghostworks designs its vessels to maximize performance across all three metrics. Ghostworks’ Minerva-class vessel can carry 17,500 lbs at a cruise speed of 30 knots and handles sea state 4. Minerva is the first to employ MRLN, allowing operators to control the craft remotely, mission to mission, whether delivering fuel to an isolated craft, carrying a high-value load, or racing to conduct a rescue. Deployed across Ghostworks’ proprietary hull forms, MRLN provides granular control over that performance tradeoff for the first time.
MRLN pairs its modular, subsystem-agnostic architecture with a proven, serious payload capacity. The system is human-in-the-loop: a human operator retains situational awareness even as the vessel runs autonomously and can take control of the craft at any time. Operators can reconfigure mission profiles in the field, giving commanders a platform that adapts to the fight instead of forcing the fight to adapt to the platform. That freedom is the point. MRLN was built to function anywhere, anytime with its own connectivity.
“For decades, naval planners have had to accept that speed, range, and payload pull against each other. Optimize for one and you sacrifice the others,” said Brooke Kerschbaumer, CEO, Ghostworks. “Our vessels were architected to break that constraint. MRLN gives operators human-in-the-loop command and control over that tradeoff space, mission to mission, without changing platforms.”
“Leveraging our development of world-leading autonomy for air-vehicles into the maritime domain is a natural progression,” said Jeff Hettick, vice president of GA-ASI’s Agile Mission Systems. “This partnership really highlights how bringing together the best in the defense industry can yield exciting new capabilities for our warfighters in a timescale that is relevant.”
“Our role was to prove that MRLN could meet the control and reliability demands of sustained surface operations,” said Carl Greiner, Director of Government & Advanced Maritime Systems, Mercury Marine. “This integration expands what’s achievable in a remote-piloted maritime system.”
Five Missions, One Platform
MRLN-equipped vessels are designed to support:
- ISR: persistent, low-signature surveillance in contested littoral zones
- Logistics resupply: autonomous delivery of materiel to forward-deployed forces
- Mine countermeasures: detection and neutralization without placing crews at risk
- Communications relay: extending network connectivity across dispersed operating areas
- Littoral combat support: direct integration into combat operations in shallow, contested waters
Summary
MRLN is a remote-pilot autonomy system, developed with GA-ASI and Mercury Marine, that equips Ghostworks’ M-Hull and powercat vessels to perform five distinct missions from one platform. By letting commanders reconfigure mission profiles in the field, MRLN breaks the traditional tradeoff between speed, range, and payload, delivering flexibility that the littoral battlespace has not had before.
