The U.S. Navy has awarded Lockheed Martin a 5-year, $100 million contract to provide combat system engineering services - including the design, development, integration, test and life cycle support - for all Aegis-equipped ships.

Lockheed Martin has partnered with the Navy for decades as the Aegis combat system engineering agent (CSEA), while evolving the system through nine technology baselines to outpace a wide array of dynamic and evolving threats.

"This program award validates Lockheed Martin as the Navy's choice for combat management systems," said Dale P. Bennett, executive vice president of Lockheed Martin's Mission Systems and Training.

"Our team met the Navy's challenge to reduce costs and drive innovation into Aegis CSEA by increasing productivity, utilizing automated testing and analysis and increasing the role of small businesses."

Aegis is the world's premier combat system and is the foundation for the Aegis Ballistic Missile Defense capability.

Aegis-equipped ships are multi-mission surface combatants that can simultaneously attack land targets, submarines and surface ships while automatically implementing defenses to protect the fleet against aircraft and missiles.

Aegis is also the combat system of choice for the navies of Australia, Japan, Norway, the Republic of Korea and Spain. More than one hundred Aegis-equipped ships are in service around the globe. They have more than 1,200 years of at-sea operational experience and have launched more than 3,800 missiles in tests and real-world operations.

Lockheed Martin is a leader in combat systems integration and the development of integrated air and missile defense systems and technologies. The company makes significant contributions to most major U.S. missile defense systems and participates in several global missile defense partnerships.

Lockheed Martin developed its CSEA offering with its partners Mission Solutions Engineering, General Dynamics Advanced Information System and Integrated Defense Technologies.