The defense and space division of Boeing Co. (NYSE: BA) cleared a U.S. Department of Defense hurdle on Thursday when Pentagon brass approved the sale of nine of Boeing’s P-8A Poseidon surveillance planes to the United Kingdom. The reported price for the planes is $3.2 billion.
The U.S. Congress has 15 days to cancel the sale, but no one expects that to happen. The United Kingdom, after all, is America’s closest ally and plans to use the planes for maritime patrol duty and to contribute to NATO operations.
Boeing already has sold eight of the heavily modified 737-800 jets to the Australian Air Force and another eight copies of a variation to the Poseidon (denoted the P-8I Neptune) to India. The company plans to build 109 for the U.S. Navy, and Boeing has forecast overseas sales of the spy plane at more than 100 copies.
In January Boeing announced that it would build another 20 spy planes following a $2.5 billion order from the U.S. Navy. Those planes will be delivered beginning in 2017. Boeing has so far been contracted to build 78 of the planes for the U.S. Navy and eight for Australia. The company had delivered 33 planes to the Navy as of the end of January 2016.
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