BIW nets $719M contract for DDG 51-class planning yard services

Feb. 5 (UPI) -- Bath Iron Works, a subsidiary of General Dynamics, was awarded a contract to continue providing planning yard services for DDG 51 Arleigh Burke-class guided missile destroyers.

The contract's value for the first year is $126 million and the total value is $719 million with four option years, if exercised and fully funded, the Navy announced Monday.

The majority of the planning yard services work, which includes design, material kitting, logistics, planning and execution, will be performed at Beth Iron Works' shipyard in Maine, according to a company news release.

Bath Iron Works also manages post-delivery maintenance and modernization activities for Zumwalt-class destroyers and littoral-class combat ships.

The contract was not competitively procured because no other supplies or services will satisfy agency requirements.

Funding was allocated from the Navy's fiscal 2019 operations and maintenance and other procurement funding in the amount of $21 million, including $4.5 million that will expire at the end of the current fiscal year.

The company currently has five DDG 51 destroyers under construction -- USS Daniel Inouye, USS Carl M. Levin, USS John Basilone, USS Harvey C. Barnum and USS Patrick Gallagher -- as well the Zumwalt-class destroyer USS Lyndon B. Johnson. And the USS Louis H. Wilson, Jr., Arleigh Burke-class ship, is in backlog.

Last September, BIW was awarded a $3.9 billion contract to build four class guided missile destroyers.

And then in December, BIW was awarded $910 million to build another DDG 51 Arleigh Burke-class guided missile destroyer.

On Saturday, the keel of the future USS Carl M. Levin, an Arleigh Burke-class Flight IIA guided-missile destroyer, was laid during a ceremony at General Dynamics Bath Iron Works shipyard.