1423 Powhatan St., Suite 1
Alexandria, Virginia 22314
Phone (703) 836-6727
Fax (703) 836-7491
Email: asnehq@navalengineers.org

 

ASNE is the leading professional engineering society for engineers, scientists and allied professionals who conceive, design, develop, test, construct, outfit, operate and maintain complex naval and maritime ships, submarines and aircraft and their associated systems and subsystems.  ASNE also serves the educators who train the professionals, researchers who develop related technology, and students who are preparing for the profession.  Society activities provide support for the U.S. Navy; U.S. Coast Guard; U.S. Marine Corps; U.S. Merchant Marine and U.S. Army.

ASNE is the seventh oldest technical society in the United States.  It was founded in 1888 by a group of naval engineering pioneers, most of them officers of the U.S. Navy's Engineering Corps, who sought a unified approach to their profession in order to make the most of new advances in technology. The purposes of ASNE are:           

  • to advance the knowledge and practice of naval engineering in public and private applications and operations,
  • to enhance the professionalism and well-being of members, and
  • to promote naval engineering as a career field.

For 125 years, the Society’s objectives have been strengthened and preserved to meet the changing needs of a time-honored profession. Today ASNE conducts a variety of technical meetings and symposia, publishes the highly regarded Naval Engineers Journal and a number of other technical proceedings and publications, and fosters professional development and technical information exchange through technical committees, local section activities and cooperative efforts with government organizations and other professional societies.

The Society's annual meeting, ASNE Day, is typically held in February of each year in the Washington, DC, area. The meeting features major addresses by high level industry and government leaders and panel discussions by leading members of the profession.  It also includes presentation and discussion of technical papers on a variety of timely naval engineering topics, presentation of the Society's prestigious annual awards and a large exposition with government and industry exhibits covering the full spectrum of naval engineering technology. ASNE Day is highlighted by the Society’s annual Honors Gala, attended by hundreds of executives and senior managers from both government and industry.

Our website is designed to not only serve our members, but also to support scholars, students and others interested in the varied field of naval engineering.  We welcome your suggestions on ways we can improve your experience. 

Robert G. Keane, Jr., SES (Ret.)


Award: Frank G. Law Award
2018
Robert G. Keane, Jr., SES (Ret.)
Reason: For outstanding contributions to the advancement of the Society through dedicated service as set forth in the following

CITATION:

During his over 50 year illustrious career, Mr. Robert G. Keane Jr. has demonstated superb leadership through selfless dedication and personal commitment by providing many professional contributions in developing technical panels, seminars and initiatives to further the Society’s objectives, professional stature and operations.

Mr. Keane brought in young naval engineers, early in their professional careers and leadership development, to collaborate with well established, highly experienced naval engineering leaders in the Joint Ship Design Committee (SDC). Through this initiative of having young engineers contribute to the profession of naval engineering he personally created a leadership development culture within this technical community. Furthermore, he believes strongly that professional societies amplify the value of Human Capital (HC) by turning individual knowledge into intellectual material. As a result of his beliefs and his far-reaching network of highly experienced professionals, he personally initiated, organized and conducted the Ship Design & Acquisition Lessons Learned Seminars program, which was a monthly event sponsored by the ASNE Flagship Section, featuring experienced professionals whose careers in Ship Design and Acquisition totaled hundreds of years of experience.

Under the auspices of the Global Shipbuilding Executive Summit (GSES), Mr. Keane has been one of the predominant leaders of the “Flexible Warships Initiative.” Under his leadership, his team developed proposals for identifying and/or developing work content analysis tools as well as design methods for addressing distributed systems during Design Space Exploration (DSE) in early stage ship concept design. This application of new designs and methods permitted a more accurate means of evaluating design principles for flexible ships. Teaming with a highly experienced shipyard production executive, his team identified these principles for design of flexible ships and emphasized that under-sizing the ship during concept design studies increases ship outfit density and adds unnecessary complexities to the design and construction of the ship. The recent GSES study of foreign naval ships validates that early-stage design decisions on properly sizing the ship are a major contributor to reducing complexities of designs, leading to work content reductions in Detail Design and Construction (DD&C) and providing more flexible naval ships for future upgrades and modernizations.

For his leadership in mentoring two generations of young naval engineers and his significant contributions to developing ASNE forums for furthering the knowledge base on flexible, modular ships, the American Society of Naval Engineers is honored to name Mr. Robert G. Keane Jr. the recipient of the 2018 Frank G. Law Award.