Lockheed Martin has received a $12.5bn contract modification for the production and delivery of 148 F-35 fighter aircraft, according to a U.S. Department of Defense announcement.
The award finalises the procurement of Lot 18 aircraft and adds scope for Lot 19 production, covering 148 jets across U.S. services, partner nations, and foreign military sales customers. The contract is managed under fixed-price incentive, firm-fixed-price, and cost-plus-fixed-fee terms, the Department of Defense added.
According to the Pentagon, the breakdown includes 40 F-35A aircraft for the U.S. Air Force, 12 F-35B and eight F-35C aircraft for the Marine Corps, and nine F-35C aircraft for the U.S. Navy. Partner nations will receive 13 F-35A and two F-35B aircraft, while foreign military sales customers are allocated 52 F-35A and 12 F-35B aircraft.
Work will be performed primarily in Fort Worth, Texas (57 percent), with additional contributions from El Segundo, California (14 percent), Warton in the United Kingdom (9 percent), Cameri, Italy (4 percent), Orlando, Florida (4 percent), Nashua, New Hampshire (3 percent), Baltimore, Maryland (3 percent), San Diego, California (2 percent), Nagoya, Japan (2 percent), and other locations outside the continental U.S. (2 percent). Completion is expected in August 2028.
Funding obligations at the time of award total over $11 billion, drawn from fiscal year 2023, 2024, and 2025 procurement accounts, as well as cooperative partner and foreign military sales funds. The U.S. Department of Defense noted that $28,876 of fiscal 2023 Navy aircraft procurement funds will expire at the end of the current fiscal year.
The U.S. Naval Air Systems Command, based at Patuxent River, Maryland, is the contracting authority.
The air vehicle production contract adds jets for the U.S. services, international partners and Foreign Military Sales (FMS) customers. Deliveries on these lots begin in 2026.
How much work in the UK comes from this? I thought we made a small part of each F35?
‘Warton in the United Kingdom (9 percent)’- though Ii thought we were meant to get 15%
that’s what i thought. perhaps we contribute more to f35b?
For F35b I believe Rolls Royce make the lift fan gearbox. So the percentage would be higher for that model
They’re both made in the US
I just looked into it a bit more. You’re right that the gearbox is made in Indianapolis, but the RR LiftWorks factory in Bristol makes the lift fan and the 3BSM (the thrust vectored rear exhaust for the rear of the engine)
Lift fan is manufactured in Indianapolis.
The majority of orders are for A & C orders where the UK content is at best around 12-15% – only the B attracts up to 40%. But that has always been by value not physical content, and value (ie figures) are affected primarily by the US/UK exchange rate. At the end of the day the UK still produces more parts and structure for the F35 than any other nation than the US
Wildly optimistic
Not really a ‘small’ part. The rear fuselage sections and tail fins are all made in a BAE factory in Samlesbury (Lancashire). Some of the avionics are BAE as well. Beyond that I don’t know.
Officially, 15%. Worth £22billion so far to UK according to NAO. Plus another say £1billion from this order. Good business.
The 15% includes work done by Americans in UK owned businesses located in the US/
BTW I am not sure the NAO has stated a percentage,
It mentions that our workshare is 9%. I have serious doubts about the UK ordering any more F-35s, we can’t even get spares for the ones we have at the moment: They are all owned by Lockheed Martin and delivered on a just in time basis.
The French were smart building most of their own equipment. Don’t they produce something like 90% of their own gear?
“I have serious doubts about the UK ordering any more F-35s”
For me the F35 has been a disaster for the UK and I think the B Variant is a dead-end for us. It is expensive to operate and can be challenging to fix (see the jet stranded in India) whilst making us very dependent on the US for spares.
I think instead of ordering more than the original 48 (49 with the crashed jet replaced) we should have:
– Used the money allocated for the second order to buy EMALs for the carriers. This would then allow us in the early 2040s to replace the F35s with the new French made carrier jet and acquire heavy UAVs in the meantime. This would give us full flexibility in the future over which aircraft we want to operate and eliminate many of out current CSG woes.
– 48 F35s is enough for a single QE. The French only have ordered 46 Rafale M and as we were never planning on operating two carriers simultaneously 48 F35B is enough in the interim provided we replace the RAF’s T1 Typhoons so F35 become solely for carrier ops.
– The whole F35A order for the UK is a total waste of time and money.
Also see this damning article on F35 sortie rates:
https://aviationweek.com/defense/budget-policy-operations/uk-f-35-full-operational-capability-path-faces-scrutiny
“In its report, the NAO found that the UK’s F-35 fleet had mission-capable rates at one-third of the government’s target, driven largely by a shortage of engineers—an issue that is likely to hinder the program for years to come.”
Disagree – the F35 is an outstanding capability which combined with Meteor and Spear3 enables us to control the air. Whilst the numbers of new airframes are glacially slow to grow I have confidence that our procurement will evolve.
Meteor and Spear3 are integrated on Typhoon but they will not be on F35 until 2030+.
We are completely beholden to the whims of Lockheed Martin and the IS government. Whilst the F35 is capable because of its stealth and sensor suite it isn’t a UK sovereign platform.
I also predict it will be eclipsed by the sixth gen platforms.
By not investing in EMALs we locked into whatever the US replaces the F35B with.
That would be great, if Meteor and Spear 3 were actually integrated, but they won’t be until the 2030s at the earliest, at which point they’ll be well on their way to being obselete. The whole thing has been pretty terrible so far, and is having so many knock on effects on capability that just focusing on upgrading Typhoon to T4 and ordering dozens more would probably have been better overall.
The major reason the UK’s F-35B’s are slow to be fixed is because the UK did not buy sufficient spare parts. Same goes for the other aircraft in its inventory.
What new French made carrier jet ? One of the reasons the SCAF programme is stalled is because Germany refuses to fund a maritime version that it has no use for . The french are stuck with Rafale for the foreseeable future and therefore in the 4.5 generation world . For all it’s perceived problems I’d rather have F35 until GCAP arrives hopefully with it’s own maritime version .
GCAP is a massive bomb truck aircraft that would be hard to make a marine variant for.
Regardless of what aircraft we go for the priority in the 2030s should be fitting EMALs to the carriers.
I personally think the French will go it alone and produce something. Maybe Spain will stick with them.
The Italians are talking about getting into the CSG game so it wouldn’t hurt to have a joint UK, French, Italian carrier aircraft.
If your comment about GCAP is true then SCAF will have the same challenges , particularly with Germany’s requirements. GCAP is not going to be STOVL so your argument for EMALS is a given . For once I doubt the French have the finances or the know how to go 6th gen. all alone . If they were going to do that they would never have involved Germany in the first place . France is an unreliable partner and workshare arguments would stink out the programme for years probably ending in nothing happening . Eurofighter / Rafale . Horizon / Type 45 etc . Best leave them out of it imo .
I don’t recall a maritime version of GCAP ever being mentioned? I agree that the omission of at least the capability to retro-fit EMALS into(onto?) the carriers is strategically baffling. My understanding is that was initally a prerequisite part of the carrier design but was subsequently removed/missed off dependant on your opinion and Im not sure its even possible.now. We are completely beholding to LM for both the procurement , and more importantly the arming, of our F35B capability-whatever level that ends up as.
I don’t disagree with any if your comments and the whole future maritime capability is a grey area at best . It’s a mess . However I’ll stick by my comment that involving the French , as suggested by the other reply, is not going to make anything better . Their mess , SCAF and moving on from 4.5 gen. Rafale M , is bigger than our mess .
Comparing the number we’ve ordered with the number made I think we’ve made quite a nice profit on the deal.
OOD, Unfortunately our carriers were not built so as to be able to easily incorporate ‘cats and traps’ in future, althiough it was originally stted that they would be. The cost would be immense and each carrier would be out of service for far too long when so being fitted. EMALS is very unrelaible at the moment.
No, it’s not. 5 years ago. Yes, not now
The Harrier GR7 was expensive to operate and a mare to maintain for only a fraction of the capability F35B provides. A large chunk of it was also developed and made by McDonnell Douglas.
I presume there is one “lot” per year? Struggling to find information on this online.
So that’s 69 F35s for the US military, when it is retiring at least double that number of jets per year. They do have F/A-18E/F/G and F-15EX procurement in addition, of about 20 of each type per year, but those are only 4.5 generation jets.
Meanwhile China is pumping out *at least* 100 5th Gen J20 aircraft per year, another 100 J16 (SU-30 derivative) per year, and is starting full rate production of its second 5th gen fighter, the J35. Russia is also producing about 20 5th Gen SU-57s per year, plus small numbers of other types.
The West is falling behind, and seriously needs to get its act together.
Russia produced 11 SU-57 in 2023.
It aimed for 20 in 2024, it only managed to build 7.
Good knowledge. I wonder if that was just teething issues with production, or something more fundamental? Regardless, China is the real threat, and Russia could well turn to China, especially if the Ukraine war ends (so China gets less slack for selling to them), and Russia gets past its own pride (taking delivery of military equipment from North Korea suggests they are pretty much there).
Also if the Ukraine war ceases, and sanctions are eased, Russia will find it easier to ramp up production of more advanced equipment, even if the motivation to do so has decreased. I suspect they’ll redirect resources away from land based asset production and drones; and into air and naval (but especially air).
There will be teething problems, they still exist on the F35 and probably F22 too. But mainly production issues – the Russian economy is a slow-motion car-crash at the moment.
Some kind of Faustian pact between Russia and China is possible. Russia to get Chinese electronics, China to get Russian engine technology, all comes down to how paranoid they are of each other.
Even if the Ukraine War ends, sanctions will remain. Partly until Russia pays reparations for reconstruction. But also Russia has drawn Trump’s ire for siding with China – who is the Trump administration’s big adversary.
Russia has also seen a huge brain drain of people fleeing the country, and of course a significant proportion of its population is now either dead on a Ukrainian battlefield or left-limbs there.
How long before even the most enthusiastic supporter of the QEs begins to realize that the F 35 is the wrong aircraft for the UK. Given its continuing low availability rate in peacetime, it simply wouldn’t cope with sustained operations. For the limited capability acquired, the costs of carriers + F35B have been far too high, squeezing the budget for everything else.
The problem is we are in the position at this point that limits out decision making to how many we should commit to. I think we should buy more Typhoons but again all that does is at best affect numbers of F-35s and what version we buy and maintain. All we can do is try to learn for future decisions that are still somewhat distant while we have to deal with present and near term threats.
The Boondoggle continues.
I love Fresh Crab, just picking all the good bits off, lovely ummmm.
Now then, what have I missed ?
I had fresh crab in the shell at a Restaurant in Durban 25 years ago and it was a pain in the backside-have not had it since. Had snails with camembert -those were quite nice. I don’t support the idea to fit Emals to the QE’s. Expensive and would take them out of service for some time. As for the F35 well-bring back the Harrier and don’t even mention the French made carrier jet!!!
Light blue touch paper and withdraw to a safe distance. The “A” has proved itself in Israeli service. And Nato will field a large F35 fleet soon. The “B’s” problems in the UK are multiple and well known. I know many RAF guys who moved or refused to work on it for one simple reason. They did not join the RN and do not want to spend time at sea.
Poor babies.
I’m confidently expecting the UK order for 148 Vanquish, short take and landing stealth drones for the RN. In the distance, if I look hard I can just see an engineer in BAE Warton unveiling that stealth Harrier design they have been sitting on 🙂
I always appreciate your optimism, Paul!
They can do it. Taranis + Harrier = Vanquish. How hard can it be?
The United States has already received over 600 F 35 aircraft. The United States plan to procure over 1700 F 35. China is not out producing the United States.
Yes that. Vastly. China is producing 100+ J20 per year, 100+ J16 per year, and is starting full rate production of J35 this year.
US is producing about 125 F35s, about have of which are for export; plus about 20 F-15EX and 20 F/A-18E/F/G. And they have an F-16 production line open for export orders only. Europe is producing virtually nothing (probably about 25 Typhoons/Rafales/Gripens combined).
And let’s not even get started on naval production…
In other news, I see Germany has placed its order for 20 Tranche 5 Typhoons built to the electronic warfare standard. I wonder if it means they will be fitted with the ECRS MK2 radar instead of the Mk1?
Fat chance