Fincantieri Marinette Marine is set to start construction on the first Constellation-class frigate next spring as the company continues work on the ship’s design, the company’s CEO said Thursday.
Fincantieri Marinette Marine CEO Mark Vandroff said during a Defense One event that the company is investing in both its infrastructure and workforce as it prepares to start frigate construction. The company has invested more than $250 million into shipyard infrastructure, he said.
The Navy issued Fincantieri Marinette Marine a $795 million contract to design and build its next-generation frigate in April 2020, with options for the delivery of up to 10 ships for a total of $5.5 billion. The service exercised its option for the second frigate, FFG-63, in May.
The detailed design phase for the program will be completed with the critical design review set for February, Vandroff said. The production readiness review is scheduled for March and the full-rate production of the first frigate is set to start in April, he added.
The program is behind the schedule laid out in the Government Accountability Office’s annual acquisitions report, released in June, which stated the critical design review was set for this August with lead-ship fabrication start scheduled for October.
The company started the detailed design at the time of the contract award and has been ordering long-lead time material for the first ship, according to Vandroff. This includes raw products like steel and pipe but also finished products like engines, steering gears and pumps, he said.
Vandroff said the company has provided regular deliverables to the Navy during the design process to ensure the design matches the Navy’s wishes and contract.
Frigate program manager Capt. Kevin Smith said in August that the Navy is adjusting the ship’s design to widen and elongate the hull while retaining the internal design.
Vandroff said the program plans to have the first frigate in the water by 2025 and delivered to the Navy in 2026.
The Navy plans to procure a total of 20 frigates, 10 of which are already under contract with Fincantieri Marinette Marine. The service is considering adding a second shipyard to the program, though Smith said in August the second yard is “pre-decisional.”
Vandroff said the frigate program will provide Fincantieri Marinette Marine work throughout the decade, with the possibility of more work if the company gets another contract for more frigates.
“That alone is work for the shipyard throughout the entire decade of the 2020s, and given the Navy’s stated need for how many frigates they actually ultimately need, we expect to building frigates here for at least the next two decades,” Vandroff said.
Fincantieri’s capital investments will allow the company to deliver two frigates a year to the Navy, Vandroff said. Depending on the Navy’s order, the company will be able to deliver a ship every six months to a year.
“It’s been a very significant capital renovation here at Marinette, in excess of $250 million worth of new facilities designed to enable us to produce those frigates efficiently for the Navy,” he said.
The company is building a 130-foot-tall frigate erection bay, which Vandroff said would be the largest structure in northeast Wisconsin other than Lambeau Field, home of the Green Bay Packers. It will also allow the company to produce the ship inside a climate-controlled environment, which is necessary to produce the ship on schedule and on budget, he said.
Construction on that bay started shortly after the contract award last year, and it will be ready for shipbuilding activity next summer, Vandroff said.
“In this bay, we’ll be able to fit two complete Constellation-class frigates,” he said.
The company is also building a syncrolift, which is scheduled to be completed in December 2022. The syncrolift will be the largest in North America when finished, Vandroff said.
“We feel this will really help enable efficient production for the Constellation-class frigate,” he said.
Fincantieri Marinette Marine is planning on hiring 400 additional trade workers over the next two years in order to be able to ramp up for the frigate program, according to Vandroff.
The company is partnering with the states of Wisconsin and Michigan on workforce development, including working with community colleges to provide workforce training, he said.
“It will be a big project, and one of the things I am tracking most closely is getting the workforce recruited, retained, trained and on the job in order to build these ships for our customers,” Vandroff said.