Lockheed Martin has been awarded a cost-plus-fixed-fee letter contract, with performance incentives, to equip the third South Korean destroyer, KDX-III Ship 3, with its Aegis weapon system.

The contract is part of the foreign military sales programme to the Republic of Korea and funds an integrated test team to assist the Korean shipyard in performing installation and testing of the Aegis combat system.

As per the $40.6m contract, Lockheed will provide combat systems engineering and ship integration installation and test support, phase one computer programming as well as equipment to deliver the system.

The Aegis weapon system is capable of simultaneously attacking land targets, submarines and surface ships, while automatically implementing defences against aircraft and missiles.

Work will be performed in Korea, New Jersey, Norway and France, and is expected to be completed by September 2012.