18 Feb 02. Following the announcement last year by ministers, BAE SYSTEMS confirmed that its Type 45 Prime Contract Office has received an order for a further three platforms for the Type 45 Destroyer, bringing the total number of platforms now on order to six. The total contracted value of the Type 45 programme is now approximately £2bn.This order is concurrent with binding agreements concluded with the two shipyards – BAE SYSTEMS Marine and Vosper Thornycroft – for their workshare in respect of the Type 45 platform. These agreements give these shipyards a guaranteed level of work to the end of the decade and enables them to make the necessary new investment needed for such a complex ship.

Nigel Stewart, Acting Managing Director, Type 45 said: “The platform negotiations between the Prime Contract Office (PCO) and the two shipyards have been extremely challenging, but have been conducted in a very constructive manner. The outcome is very positive for all parties and delivers the benefits of both a stable long term workload and a cost effective solution. Now that all of the key principles relating to the platform procurement have been agreed, we have a solid foundation on which to continue to move forward and deliver our programme commitments to the DPA.” In parallel to the shipyard negotiations, we have placed contracts for all of the Power Systems, as well as the majority of the Combat System. 50% of the major Platform subsystem contracts have also been signed by our team in Glasgow. Taking into account today’s commitments with the shipyards, subcontracts to a total value approaching £1.25bn have been placed over the last 12 months and virtually all remaining subcontracts will have been signed by the middle of this year. “Brian Phillipson, Group Managing Director, Sea Systems, said: “I am delighted with the confirmation of this order and the shipyard contracts. The agreements set out a long-term future for warship building in BAE SYSTEMS and Vosper Thornycroft and secures a major part of the future surface fleet for the Royal Navy. It was crucial that we all reached agreement on a variety of complex details which has now been achieved. We thus have in place solid foundations for the future of military shipbuilding in the United Kingdom.”Following a rigorous third Design Review, the ship’s design has now reached a degree of maturity which will provide a low risk basis for progression into detailed systems and physical integration design activities.

The work is being jointly managed out of the Type 45 Platform Design Centre (PDC) at Scotstoun, Glasgow and the Prime Contract Office in Filton, Bristol. The PDC houses an integrated design team with staff from the Prime Contract Office, BAE SYSTEMS Marine and Vosper Thornycroft as well as customer representatives, which has already been working together for the last 12 months. This team is expected to grow to around 600 people over the next few months. The Platform Design Centre’s responsibilities include designing the structure of the ship, utilising the latest Finite Element Analysis Software; and using 3D Computer Aided Design (CAD) technology to design the systems and accommodation, thus ensuring that the Type 45 is a highly capable ship, setting new standards of habitability and supportability for the Royal Navy.