JSF (F-35)

JSF (F-35) PROGRAM SUMMARY

Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) is a development and acquisition program intended to replace a wide range of existing fighter, strike, and ground attack aircraft for the United States, the United Kingdom, Turkey, Italy, Canada, Australia, the Netherlands and their allies. The projected average annual cost of this program is $12.5 billion with an estimated program life-cycle cost of $1.1 trillion. The Joint Strike Fighter is the most expensive weapons system ever developed. Lockheed is developing the F-35 for the Marines, Air Force, and Navy; eight countries that helped fund its development: Britain, Canada, Australia, Norway, Italy, Turkey, Denmark and the Netherlands. Israel and Japan have also ordered the jet.

GENERAL DATES

DATES WITH PIONEER

• 1996: The JSF development contract was signed
• 2001: The contract for System Development and Demonstration (SDD) was awarded on 26 October 2001 to Lockheed Martin
• 2006: On 7 July 2006, the U.S. Air Force, the lead service for the aircraft, officially announced the name of the F-35: Lightning II, in honor of Lockheed’s World War II-era twin-propeller Lockheed P-38 Lightning for the United States Army Air Forces and the Cold War-era jet, the English Electric Lightning for the Royal Air Force.
• 2009: On 6 April 2009, U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates proposed speeding up production for the U.S. to buy 2,443 F-35s.
• 2011: In February 2011, the Pentagon put a price of $207.6 million on each of the 32 aircraft to be acquired in FY2012, rising to $304.16 million
• 2012: In May 2012, Lockheed Martin Chief Executive Bob Stevens complained that the Defense Department’s requirements for cost data were themselves driving up program costs.
• 2012: According to a June 2012 Government Accountability Office report, the F-35’s unit cost had almost doubled, with an increase of 93% over the program’s original, 2001 baseline cost estimates
• 2012: In 2012, Lockheed Martin reportedly feared that the tighter policies of the Obama administration regarding award fees would reduce their profits by $500 million over the coming five years.
• 2020: The U.S. Government estimates that in 2020 an F-35 will cost some $85m each, or less than half of the cost of the initial units delivered in 2009. Adjusted to today’s dollars, the 2020 price would be $75m each.

• 2003: First JSF Booking placed by 461-Northrop Grumman ES&SS
• 2007:  552-GE Aviation Systems Group LTD places their first JSF booking
• 2007: 221-Raytheon Systems places their first JSF booking
•  2008: 410-HARRIS CORPORATION, GCSD places their first JSF booking
•  2008: 782-Kitron AS places their first JSF booking
• 2010: 210-Honeywell-Florida places their first JSF booking
• 2014: 611-Rockwell Collins-Cedar Rapids places their first JSF booking
• 2016: 927-AYESAS places their first JSF booking
• 2016: 549-LMCO Missiles & Fire Control – ORL places their first JSF booking

CUSTOMERS ON PROGRAM

SUPPLIERS

• 461-Northrop Grumman ES&SS
• 552-GE Aviation Systems Group LTD
• 221-Raytheon Systems
•  410-HARRIS CORPORATION, GCSD
•  782-Kitron AS
• 210-Honeywell-Florida
• 611-Rockwell Collins-Cedar Rapids
• 927-AYESAS
• 549-LMCO Missiles & Fire Control

• Lockheed Martin Aeronautics is the prime contractor and performs aircraft final assembly, overall system integration, mission system, and provides forward fuselage, wings and aircraft flight control system.
• Northrop Grumman provides active electronically scanned array (AESA) radar, electro-optical AN/AAQ-37 Distributed Aperture System (DAS), Communications, Navigation, Identification (CNI), center fuselage, weapons bay, and arrestor gear.
• BAE Systems provides the Flight Control Software (FCS1), the electronic warfare systems, crew life support and escape systems, aft fuselage, empennages as well as the horizontal and vertical tails.
• Alenia will perform final assembly for Italy and, according to an Alenia executive, assembly of all European aircraft with the exception of Turkey and the United Kingdom.

ANNUAL REVENUE HISTORY

PROGRAM HISTORY

• After a competition between the Boeing X-32 and the Lockheed Martin X-35, a final design was chosen based on the X-35.
• Two contracts to develop prototypes were awarded on November 16, 1996, one each to Lockheed Martin and Boeing.
• During concept definition, two Lockheed Martin airplanes were flight-tested: the X-35A (which was later converted into the X-35B), and the larger-winged X-35C. Arguably the most persuasive demonstration of the X-35’s capability was the final qualifying Joint Strike Fighter flight trials, in which the X-35B STOVL aircraft took off in less than 500 feet, went supersonic, and landed vertically – a feat that Boeing‘s entry was unable to achieve.
• The contract for System Development and Demonstration (SDD) was awarded on 26 October 2001 to Lockheed Martin,whose X-35 beat the Boeing X-32.

CURRENT & FUTURE NEWS

• The U.S. Government estimates that in 2020 an F-35 will cost some $85m each, or less than half of the cost of the initial units delivered in 2009. Adjusted to today’s dollars, the 2020 price would be $75m each.
• The US Navy believes budget pressures and competing priorities could drive it to purchase fewer Lockheed Martin F-35Cs per year in the 2020s, and a worst-case scenario could see it procure as few as 12 aircraft per year, or one squadron.
• The Navy paying $265 million per F-35C in fiscal year 2014, but also because the navy has a more modern combat fleet comprised mostly of newer F/A-18 Super Hornets.
• Lockheed Martin aims to bring the average cost of an F-35A down to $80 million by 2019, but much of the anticipated savings come from increased quantities.
• The company expects to ramp up Joint Strike Fighter production to more than 160 aircraft in 2019, and is also eyeing a multi-year block buy for about 450 jets that combines domestic and international orders.