The US Department of War has announced the conclusion of a new contract for the purchase of Tomahawk cruise missiles in the latest version of Block V. A total of 219 missiles are being ordered at once, which is the largest simultaneous order for this long-range weapon in recent times, since 2022.
Under the terms of the contract, Raytheon is to produce 219 of these cruise missiles for $ 384 million, which are intended for the Navy, Marine Corps and US Army, as well as for two foreign customers (apparently - Australia and Japan). At the same time, this contract is not an independent one, but an extension of the order that was announced on December 19, 2024.
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Then, a deal was announced for 131 cruise missiles for the same customers for $401.2 million. In total, now the entire order under the contract (N0001925C0071) is 350 missiles for $785.2 million.
Thus, the average cost of one Tomahawk missile has decreased from $3 million to $2.2 million, taking into account the fact that the notional cost in the additional order is generally $1.75 million. This quite clearly demonstrates how much the cost of a unit of production can decrease depending on the volume of production.
It is also worth paying attention to the deadlines for the new additional order in 2025, as the message indicates that the expected completion date of the work is January 2029. It should be recalled that the main order in 2024 had a deadline of March 2028.
Thus, Raytheon should somewhat accelerate the production of Tomahawk. Previously, the production rate was supposed to be a nominal 3.35 missiles per month, and now the average Tomahawk production rate should increase to a nominal 7.14 missiles per month.
In general, this order is quite comparable to the previous one, from 2022, when two agreements were announced under the contract (N0001922C0031) for the purchase of similar missiles, in the amount of 154 units for 217.12 million dollars (May 24, 2022) and an option (December 16, 2022) for 111 units for 171.18 million dollars.
That is, a total of 265 missiles for 388.3 million dollars at a price of 1.46 per one in 2022 prices. The completion date of the work was planned for November 2025. The average production rate in 2022-2025 was 6 missiles per month.
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