Let's look backward, shall we, to October 2001. That's when Lockheed Martin Aeronautics Co. in Fort Worth, Texas, received an $18.98 billion cost-plus-award-fee contract for the Joint Strike Fighter Air System Engineering and Manufacturing Development Program. According to award details, the objectives were to "develop an affordable family of strike aircraft and an autonomic logistics support and training system." So, a little more than 17 years ago. Nothing about the timeline is terribly unusual for development of a military platform. The F-35 program faced more than its fair share of problems and criticisms tied to delays, cost overruns and manufacturing problems that needed to be addressed. But as far as time to full-rate production, complex systems take a long time. Theoretically, though, it would seem ludicrous to allocate nearly two decades to develop a tech system, considering how rapidly technology evolves. And that brings us to ALIS.
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