re: Who needs it?
After decades of SF almost always depicting a human or humanoid crew (social organic life forms, that's the point) and of course our own space programs and naval ships, it's hard to start thinking beyond the paradigm of a ship that is its own self-contained being. But it makes a lot more practical sense, especially when interstellar exploration becomes more than just a lot of talk and conference papers.
And if you were an Artilect, you would be your own company. Until you met other Artilects from other civilizations. I bet you a quatloo that the first encounter between us and an alien race will be AIs, or Artilects as Hugo de Garis likes to call them.
http://www.cs.usu.edu/~degaris/
What SF stories have you written?