navy contract, page-3

Sorry about the two long articles, but it gives a good overall picture of the state of play for Austal.

Here is a third brief snip form Jane's about a day ago which completes the recent news for the company-


"Australian shipbuilder Austal Limited has been awarded a USD125 million contract to design and construct two naval vessels for an unidentified Middle East customer.

The 72 m High Speed Support Vessels (HSSVs) will be built at Austal's Henderson Shipyard in Western Australia. According to a statement released by the company on 10 March, construction of the first vessel is expected to commence in 2014, while the second vessel is due to be delivered in 2016.

The HSSVs will be deployed on similar missions as the Joint High Speed Vessels (JHSVs) currently under construction for the US Navy (USN) at the Austal USA shipyard in Mobile, Alabama."

The point of all this is pure speculation on my part, but...
If the Americans (and the Japanese) are looking for a smaller version of the JHSV type ships, the two HSSVs contracted by the unknown middle east buyer will be soon under construction, and at 30 metres shorter than the earlier ships and having a similar role, would appear to be ideal for what looks like the developments in the US both in the funding and the type of ship they are looking for.
And by the time real decisions are made the construction of the first one at Henderson will be well underway by the look of it.