USN PBL Contract For MH-60R Expected This Month.

The US Navy (USN) is expected to settle on terms for a new performance-based logistics (PBL) contract with Sikorsky-Lockheed Martin joint venture Maritime Helicopter Support Company , for its Sikorsky MH-60R Seahawk maritime helicopter fleet by the end of the month, company officials said during a 12 January press briefing at the Surface Navy Association's 2015 conference.

USN PBL Contract For MH-60R Expected This Month.

"The renewal is in negotiation," said George Mitchell, vice-president for aircraft and support at Sikorsky. "We expect to have it in place this month." The deal would cover USN MH-60R sustainment through 2020, he added.

The USN has internal modelling on flight hours and uses it to come up with its demand forecast. MHSCo then makes an independent forecast, Mitchell said. The two negotiate to refine a demand forecasting model and a price for the contract. "We have to forecast now on what the future is going to look like," he explained.

Lockheed Martin and Sikorsky formed MHSCo in 2000 to meet USN and US Coast Guard (USCG) MH-60 logistics needs. Mitchell called it the "largest logistics operation in naval aviation". While the aircraft's radar is covered under the PBL deal, its dipping sonar, forward-looking infrared (FLIR) sensor, and other subsystems are not. The engine is also maintained under a separate contract.

Under a PBL contract, a company is paid a fixed price to deliver a performance outcome - in this case for flight hours. "We are paid a fixed price per flight hour," said Rod Skotty, the president of MHSCo. "So it's in our interest that the aircraft is always ready for taskings." Skotty noted that MHSCo has increased MH-60 readiness rates from 62% in early 2008 to 92% currently.

Internationally, the Royal Australian Navy has a PBL deal for its MH-60R fleet, and the company continues to court Denmark.

Skotty added that he believes the model can be applied to "any large programme where sustainment challenges exist". MHSCo has been "working with [the US] Army to show how they can save with a PBL model," said Skotty. However, after several years of discussions the army has decided to keep its organic sustainment model. PBL "would be a radical change to the way the army sustains aircraft," he admitted.

MHSCo primarily targets platforms that contain both Sikorsky and Lockheed Martin components for PBL deals. For example, the Lockheed Martin P-3 Orion, which is being retired out of the USN but still has a large international presence, is a target for the company.