O'Connors 15B wishlist.....

[yoman]

More details on the JSS. It says they will have a standard crew of up to 165.

http://www.forces.gc.ca/site/newsroom/view_news_e.asp?id=1958


According to http://www.navy.forces.gc.ca/mspa_fleet/aor_specs_tac_e.asp the current ships have a crew of 365 including air detachment.

 

[Cdn Blackshirt]

I'm just glad to see they're paying the 2-finalist companies to provide the more in-depth proposals.  That's good business practice.


Matthew. 

 

[GAP]

Here is CNN's take via Associated Press...

two paragraphs kinda caught my eye....

Last week a senate committee on defense commended the new Conservative government for addressing years of military neglect, but said in a report that Canada was far from spending enough on defense and unprepared for acts of terrorism or natural disasters.

In one of its annual reports that reviews Canadian security and defense, the Senate Committee on National Security and Defense noted Ottawa spends C$343 per capita on its armed forces, compared with C$1,733 in the United States and C$903 in Britain.

http://edition.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/americas/06/26/canada.military.ap/index.html

 

[Scoobie Newbie]

"I'm just glad to see they're paying the 2-finalist companies to provide the more in-depth proposals.  That's good business practice."

Could you explain this.

 

[Cdn Blackshirt]

"I'm just glad to see they're paying the 2-finalist companies to provide the more in-depth proposals.  That's good business practice."

Could you explain this.

Excerpts from the DND update....


Matthew. 

A fair, open and transparent process

The four consortia bidding on the project definition phase are led by:

Irving Shipbuilding

BAE Systems (Project) Limited (BAE Systems Naval Ships)

ThyssenKrupp Marine Systems AG

SNC-Lavalin Profac Inc.

The bidding consortia invited to submit implementation proposals for preliminary ship design, project implementation plans, and an in-service support plan.

Two consortia will be awarded contracts ($12.5 million each) for the project definition phase, and will compete for the final Implementation contract. Based on the definition phase plans, one consortium will be chosen for project implementation. The overall project cost is $2.9 billion. This includes a base cost of $2.1 billion, plus an estimated $800 million in contracted in-service support over 20 years.

 

[Scoobie Newbie]

Ok but how is paying those that want your contract good practise.  I really have no idea and I'm not being sarcastic.

 

[Cdn Blackshirt]

Ok but how is paying those that want your contract good practise.  I really have no idea and I'm not being sarcastic.

In order to adequatedly provide an accurate proposal to build anything that's complex (as opposed to act as a broker for a commodity such as an auto dealer or a retailer), whether that "custom build" be software, a house or a ship, if you're going to do it right you literally need to put hundreds-to-thousands-to tens of thousands of hours into the proposal and basically design not only all your key components, but also the production/assembly/manufactureing system you'll eventually use, negotiate contracts with all your suppliers in order to guarantee your internal costs prior to bidding and in particular map your production schedule which determines how all these pieces fit together (I should add if you're ever sourcing components from offshore,  you're also best to secure your currency valuations using futures contracts so you don't take a bath should one of your supplier's currencies suddenly spike against your own when you're collecting all your funds in the domestic currency).  In short, because the proposal requires such a tremendous expenditure on the part of the bidding parties, it is only ethical to respect their investment and compensate them accordingly, otherwise you are guaranteed to leave a particularly bad taste in the losing bidder's mouth which could result in them refusing to bid on future projects which in the long run really only hurts you.


Matthew. 

 

[Kirkhill]

Matthew, could you consider buying a period or two from time to time?

Also, if you are buying the time of the contractors, normally you own the information.  Consequently if contractor A has a good idea about widgets and B has good idea about grommets then you as owner of that information can better see if the two contracts can be combined in some way to achieve a third outcome.  Sometimes that can be good.  Sometimes not so good.  But it does leave the door open.  Big questions about liability then show up is something goes wrong and not everybody is on the same page.

 

[GAP]

This ultimately being a political decision, is there a possibility of the two capable contractors each building a ship??

 

[Scoobie Newbie]

Is this how Boeing and Lockheed would compete ie for the JSF?

 

[Cdn Blackshirt]

Matthew, could you consider buying a period or two from time to time?

Also, if you are buying the time of the contractors, normally you own the information.  Consequently if contractor A has a good idea about widgets and B has good idea about grommets then you as owner of that information can better see if the two contracts can be combined in some way to achieve a third outcome.  Sometimes that can be good.  Sometimes not so good.  But it does leave the door open.  Big questions about liability then show up is something goes wrong and not everybody is on the same page.

Periods?  I'm against them....  ;D

RE:  Ownership of content of proposals? - In most cases companies will not bid in such circumstances as their intellectual property is seen as their biggest asset.  That being said, you specificy items like that in your Request for Proposal terms....


Matthew. 

 

[Scoobie Newbie]

GAP ANYTHING is possible.

 

[GAP]

Well, I'm thinking, that what with an upcoming election, the Conservatives, using a Liberal tactic, are going to want to spread good cheer hither and yon...especially Quebec and the Maritimes. They go through the design phase, decide on one model, then farm it out to two shipyards all in the name of being fair.

 

[mjohnston39]

IIRC Irving is partnered with Davie, conveniently both are located in provinces that the conservatives need to pick up votes in...

http://www.jsscanada.com/team.html


Mike.

 

[Scoobie Newbie]

"conveniently"

Convenient or strategic?

 

[Cdn Blackshirt]

Well, I'm thinking, that what with an upcoming election, the Conservatives, using a Liberal tactic, are going to want to spread good cheer hither and yon...especially Quebec and the Maritimes. They go through the design phase, decide on one model, then farm it out to two shipyards all in the name of being fair.

Actually, I believe the Liberal Tactic is to screw the military over by reallocating (read as "pissing away") previous promised programs into social services. 

See 30+ year old Protecteur-class, Hercs and Trucks.

And re:  farming the JSS out to more than one shipyard?  Just my humble opinion, but getting two shipyards back up to speed after decades of neglect doesn't seem like that bad an idea to me since after JSS and BHS (which could potentially share a lot of components with JSS if it is domesitcally-produced as well), we should be immediately starting construction on the Single Ship Transition Project (or whatever the hell it's called) anyway which will require more than one shipyard.


Matthew. 

 

[George Wallace]

I was under the impression that Irving Shipbuilding was a thing of the past.  Seeing as they have completely dismantled and sold off their shipbuilding facilities in St John, New Brunswick.  If they would be awarded the contract, where and what would they build these ships with?  They would have to Sub-contract out the whole production and assembly.  That they even put in a bid, now that they are out of the shipbuilding business, puzzles me.

 

[GAP]

"conveniently"

Convenient or strategic?

Whichever one fits the moment....They could claim that it would speed up the construction of both ships by having them both built at the same time in  two different shipyards....Don't think that the Conservatives won't play politics with this or anything else. At least we get a couple of new bathtub toys.

 

[Neill McKay]

I was under the impression that Irving Shipbuilding was a thing of the past.  Seeing as they have completely dismantled and sold off their shipbuilding facilities in St John, New Brunswick.  If they would be awarded the contract, where and what would they build these ships with?

Irving Shipbuilding owns other facilities in Halifax and PEI.

 

[Kirkhill]

Perhaps we are seeing too much in the Irving/Davie consortium just now. They are just one of four interested groups.

Irving/Davie is fronting General Dynamics with some Lockheed-Martin involvement.  GD owns NASSCO which supplies the US with its T-AKRs and T-AOEs - logisitic support ships like the Bob Hope.  The T-AOEs are broadly similar to the AORs currently in service but about twice the size.  Previously there was speculation that the Davie yard in Quebec was the only one big enough to handle the job in Canada.  There may be good physical reasons for this alliance.

I would guess that the next most likely consortium to succeed is the SNC-Lavalin group that has paired with Washington Marine group that owns Vancouver and Victoria shipyards.  They too are capable of handling large vessels.  Interestingly their team includes Aker Marine (Svalbard ice-breaker) Royal Schelde (Rotterdam LPD and Amsterdam AOR) and Merwede (New Zealand Multi-Role Vessel) as well as Fincantieri which has built just about everything under the sun.

So do they want to give the contract to a Maritime company with Quebec operations or a Quebec company with West Coast operations.

The other two groups are:

BAE could come forward with something similar to what they are working on for the Royal Navy's MARS programme to replace its RFA fleet of oilers and logistics vessels.  BAE built the RNs Wave class of Oilers. They also built the LPDs Bulwark and Albion.  They would be built in Newfoundland at existing yards.

And the German Thyssen-Krupp Marine which could offer up Flensburger designs  and have them supported by Maersk.  Flensburger has built mini-AORs for the German navy and RoRos for the Royal Navy.  They have a design for an AOR of 20,000 tonnes for the German Navy that hasn't been built.  They are being fronted by a Newfoundland company in Marystown but a yard would have to be built first.

So there is something for everyone here.

http://www.nassco.com/

http://www.scheldeshipbuilding.com/products.html
http://www.merwede.com/findex.asp?div=shipyard&ct=homepage%2fcontent.htm
http://www.masamarine.com/ship_types.html
http://www.masamarine.com/ship_gov.html
http://www.fincantieri.com/

http://www.baesystems.com/

http://www.fsg-ship.de/

Interestingly enough the British MOD forced two competing bidders for their future Aircraft Carriers to merge their proposals.