Analysis of the JSF Engine Competition.

摘要

Typically dual-source competition involves more than one producer building the same build-to-print (BTP) hardware design. A more analytically challenging case occurs when two contractors develop and produce two different designs to meet the same functional requirements. Such a case was examined by the Institute for Defense Analyses in a forward-looking cost and economic analysis of the Joint Strike Fighter alternative engine program. We first considered the additional costs required to execute a competitive program between the F135 (Pratt & Whitney) and F136 (General Electric) engines. While the start-up costs (in the JSF case, an additional development program) and loss-of-learning and rate effects associated with an additional production line are analogous to those in a BTP competition, there is an array of other costs associated with the support of an additional engine design. These were accounted for in IDA's analyses, including additional government management, initial spares, and depot/training/support equipment. Also included were additional operations and support (O&S) costs such as depot-level reparables, sustaining engineering, and contractor program management (SE/PM); software support, and engine component improvement programs. All of these costs were considered as the investment required to establish competition. To have the potential for recovering this investment over the JSF's life cycle, both procurement and contractor-provided O&S services would have had to be competed effectively, and such a competition would have had to save about 18 percent of total procurement and O&S cost.