Lockheed Martin Completes Assembly Of The First International F‑35 For The United Kingdom

FORT WORTH, Texas, Novem­ber 22nd, 2011 — The first inter­na­tion­al Lock­heed Mar­tin [NYSE:LMT] F‑35 Light­ning II rolled out of the fac­to­ry Sun­day evening. The Unit­ed King­dom Min­istry of Defence will use the short takeoff/vertical land­ing (STOVL) jet, known as BK‑1, for train­ing and oper­a­tional tests.

BK‑1 will under­go func­tion­al fuel sys­tem checks before being trans­port­ed to the flight line for ground and flight tests in the com­ing months. The jet is sched­uled to be deliv­ered in 2012.

“This first F‑35 for the first inter­na­tion­al pro­gram part­ner is sym­bol­ic of the proud part­ner­ship we share with the Unit­ed King­dom,” said F‑35 Exec­u­tive Vice Pres­i­dent and Gen­er­al Man­ag­er of Pro­gram Inte­gra­tion Tom Burbage. “Work­ing togeth­er in a spir­it of col­lab­o­ra­tion, we are pro­vid­ing the men and women of the Roy­al Air Force and Roy­al Navy with unmatched 5th Gen­er­a­tion capa­bil­i­ties, while deliv­er­ing advanced tech­nol­o­gy sec­tor jobs to the U.K.”

Group Cap­tain Harv Smyth, the U.K.’s Joint Strike Fight­er (JSF) nation­al deputy stat­ed, “This is a major mile­stone in the JSF Pro­gramme for U.K., and we look for­ward to start­ing to oper­ate the first British F‑35s next year. JSF is ide­al­ly suit­ed for U.K.’s future Com­bat Air capa­bil­i­ty needs, since it pro­vides a world-class 5th Gen­er­a­tion air sys­tem, which is capa­ble of oper­at­ing from both the land and our new Queen Eliz­a­beth Class air­craft carrier.”

The U.K. will play a vital role in the F‑35’s glob­al pro­duc­tion, fol­low-on devel­op­ment and sus­tain­ment over the next 40 years, bring­ing strong eco­nom­ic ben­e­fits to the country.

“This pro­gram deliv­ers unri­valled Com­bat Intel­li­gence, Sur­veil­lance, Tar­get Acqui­si­tion and Recon­nais­sance (Com­bat ISTAR) capa­bil­i­ty to the U.K. Armed Forces, as well as being a major eco­nom­ic dri­ver by sus­tain­ing thou­sands of jobs in the U.K. over more than two decades,” added Lock­heed Mar­tin Aero U.K. Direc­tor Paul Livingston.

Glob­al par­tic­i­pa­tion is a cen­ter­piece of the F‑35 pro­gram and essen­tial for its suc­cess and afford­abil­i­ty through economies of scale. The pro­gram is com­prised of nine part­ner nations: the Unit­ed States, U.K., Italy, Nether­lands, Turkey, Cana­da, Aus­tralia, Den­mark and Nor­way. In Octo­ber 2010, Israel select­ed the F‑35A as the Israel Air Force’s next gen­er­a­tion fight­er and is sched­uled to receive the F‑35 through the U.S. government’s For­eign Mil­i­tary Sales process. Addi­tion­al­ly, Japan and the Repub­lic of Korea are cur­rent­ly con­sid­er­ing the F‑35 to recap­i­tal­ize their fight­er fleets.

The F‑35 Light­ning II is a 5th Gen­er­a­tion fight­er, com­bin­ing advanced stealth with fight­er speed and agili­ty, ful­ly fused sen­sor infor­ma­tion, net­work-enabled oper­a­tions and advanced sus­tain­ment. Lock­heed Mar­tin is devel­op­ing the F‑35 with its prin­ci­pal indus­tri­al part­ners, Northrop Grum­man and BAE Systems.

BAE Sys­tems, head­quar­tered in the U.K., brings a rich her­itage of capa­bil­i­ties to the F‑35 pro­gram, includ­ing short take­off and ver­ti­cal land­ing expe­ri­ence, advanced lean man­u­fac­tur­ing, flight test­ing and air sys­tems sustainment.

Head­quar­tered in Bethes­da, Md., Lock­heed Mar­tin is a glob­al secu­ri­ty com­pa­ny that employs about 126,000 peo­ple world­wide and is prin­ci­pal­ly engaged in the research, design, devel­op­ment, man­u­fac­ture, inte­gra­tion and sus­tain­ment of advanced tech­nol­o­gy sys­tems, prod­ucts and ser­vices. The Corporation’s 2010 sales from con­tin­u­ing oper­a­tions were $45.8 billion.

High-res­o­lu­tion image of BK‑1 rolling out of the fac­to­ry.

Media Con­tacts:
Mike Rein, + 817–763-2643; michael.j.rein@lmco.com 
Lau­rie Quin­cy, + 817–763-3980; laurie.a.quincy@lmco.com
Philip Rood, + 44 (0)20 7979 8080; philip.rood@lmco.com