In July 2007, we reported on weaknesses in the Navy’s business case for the Ford-class aircraft carrier and focused mainly on the lead ship, CVN 78. We noted that costs and labor hours were underestimated and critical technologies were immature. Today, all of this has come to pass in the form of cost growth, testing delays, and reduced capability—in other words, less for more. In August 2007, we also observed that in consequence of its optimistic business case, the Navy would likely face the choice of (1) keeping the ship’s construction schedule intact while deferring key knowledge-building events—such as land-based tests of technologies—until later, or (2) slipping the ship’s construction schedule to accommodate technology and other delays. Today, those choices have been made—the ship’s construction schedule has been delayed slightly by a few months, while other events, like land-based tests for critical technologies, have slid by years. The result is a final acquisition phase in which construction and key test events are occurring concurrently, with no margin for error without giving something else up. In its simplest form, a business case requires a balance between the concept selected to satisfy warfighter needs and the resources— technologies, design knowledge, funding, and time—needed to transform the concept into a product, in this case a ship. In a number of reports and assessments since 2007, we have consistently reported on concerns related to technology development, ship cost, construction issues, and overall ship capabilities. Absent a strong business case, the CVN 78 program deviated from its initial promises of cost and capability, which we discuss below. In August 2007, before the Navy awarded a contract to construct the lead ship, we reported on key risks in the program that would impair the Navy’s ability to deliver CVN 78 at cost, on time, and with its planned capabilities (as seen in table 1 below). Specifically, we noted that the Navy’s cost estimate of $10.5 billion and 2 million fewer labor hours made the unprecedented assumption that the CVN 78 would take fewer labor hours than its more mature predecessor—the CVN 77. The shipbuilder’s estimate—22 percent higher in cost was more in line with actual historical experience. Moreover, key technologies, not part of the shipbuilder’s estimates because they would be furnished by the government, were already behind and had absorbed much of their schedule margin. Congress expressed similar concerns about Ford-class carrier costs. The John Warner National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2007 included a provision that established (1) a procurement cost cap for CVN 78 of $10.5 billion, plus adjustments for inflation and other factors, and (2) a procurement cost cap for subsequent Ford-class carriers of $8.1 billion each, plus adjustments for inflation and other factors. The legislation in effect required the Navy to seek statutory authority from Congress in the event it determined that adjustments to the cost cap were necessary, and the reason for the adjustments was not one of six factors permitted in the law. The risks we assessed in 2007 have been realized, compounded by additional construction and technical challenges. Several critical technologies, in particular, EMALS, AAG, and DBR, encountered problems in development, which resulted in delays to land-based testing. It was important for these technologies to be thoroughly tested on land so that problems could be discovered and fixes made before installing production systems on the ship. In an effort to meet required installation dates aboard CVN 78, the Navy elected to largely preserve the construction schedule and produce some of these systems prior to demonstrating their maturity in land-based testing. This strategy resulted in significant concurrency between developmental testing and construction, as shown in figure 1 below. The burden of completing technology development now falls during the most expensive phase of ship construction. I view this situation as latent concurrency in that the overlap between technology development, testing, and construction was not planned for or debated when the program was started. Rather, it emerged as a consequence of optimistic planning. Concurrency has been made more acute as the Navy has begun testing the key technologies that are already installed on the ship, even as land based testing continues. Moreover, the timeframes for post-delivery testing, i.e. the period when the ship would demonstrate many of its capabilities, are being compressed by ongoing system delays. This tight test schedule could result in deploying without fully tested systems if the Navy maintains the ship’s ready-to-deploy date in 2020. The issues described above, along with material shortfalls, engineering challenges, and delays developing and installing critical systems, drove inefficient out-of-sequence work, which resulted in significant cost increases. This, in turn, required the Navy to seek approval from Congress to raise the legislative cost cap, which it attributed to construction cost overruns and economic inflation (as shown in figure 2 below). Along with costs, the Navy’s estimates of the number of labor hours required to construct the ship have also increased (see table 2). Recalling that in 2007, the Navy’s estimate was 2 million hours lower than the shipbuilder’s, the current estimate is a big increase. On the other hand, it is more in line with a first-in-class ship like CVN 78; that is to say, it was predictable. To manage remaining program risks, the Navy deferred some construction work and installation of mission-related systems until after ship delivery. Although this strategy may provide a funding reserve in the near term, it still may not be sufficient to cover all potential cost risks. In particular, as we reported in November 2014, the schedule for completing testing of the equipment and systems aboard the ship had become increasingly compressed and continues to lag behind expectations. This is a particularly risky period for CVN 78 as the Navy will need to resolve technical deficiencies discovered through testing—for critical technologies or the ship—concurrent with latter stage ship construction activities, which is generally more complex than much of the work occurring in the earlier stages of construction. Risks to the ship’s capability we identified in our August 2007 report have also been realized. We subsequently found in September 2013 and November 2014 that challenges with technology development are now affecting planned operational capability beyond the ship’s delivery (as shown in table 3). Specifically, CVN 78 will not demonstrate its increased sortie generation rate due to low reliability levels of key aircraft launch and recovery systems before it is ready to deploy to the fleet. Further, required reductions in personnel remain at risk, as immature systems may require more manpower to operate and maintain than expected. Ultimately, these limitations signal a significant compromise to the initially promised capability. The Navy believes that, despite these pressures, it will still be able to achieve the current $12.9 billion congressional cost cap. While this remains to be seen, the Navy’s approach, nevertheless, results in a more expensive, yet less complete and capable ship at delivery than initially planned. Even if the cost cap is met, it will not alter the ultimate cost of the ship. Additional costs will be borne later—outside of CVN 78’s acquisition costs—to account for, for example, reliability shortfalls of key systems. In such cases, the Navy will need to take costly actions to maintain operational performance by adding maintenance personnel and spare parts. Reliability shortfalls, in turn, will drive ship life cycle cost increases related to manning, repairs, and parts sparing. Deferred systems and equipment will at some point be retrofitted back onto the ship. Although increases have already been made to the CVN 79’s cost cap and tradeoffs made to the ship’s scope, it still has an unrealistic business case. In 2013, the Navy requested congressional approval to increase CVN 79’s cost cap from $8.1 billion to $11.5 billion, citing inflation as well as cost increases based on CVN 78’s performance. Since the Ford-class program’s formal system development start in 2004, CVN 79’s planned delivery has been delayed by 4 years and the ship will be ready for deployment 15 months later than expected in 2013. The Navy recently awarded a construction contract for CVN 79 which it believes will allow the program to achieve the current $11.5 billion legislative cost cap. Similar to the lead ship, the business case for CVN 79 is not commensurate with the costs needed to produce an operational ship. By any measure, CVN 79 should cost less than CVN 78, as it will incorporate important lessons learned on construction sequencing and other efficiencies. While it may cost less than its predecessor, CVN 79 is likely to cost more than estimated. As we reported in November 2014, the Navy’s strategy to achieve the cost cap: 1) relies on optimistic assumptions of construction efficiencies and cost savings; (2) shifts work—including installation of mission systems—needed to make the ship fully operational until after ship delivery; and (3) delivers the ship with the same baseline capability as CVN 78, with the costs of a number of planned mission system upgrades and modernizations postponed until future maintenance periods. Even with ambitious assumptions and planned improvements, the Navy’s current estimate for the CVN 79 stands at $11.5 billion—already at the cost cap. For perspective, the Director of the Department of Defense’s (DOD) Cost Assessment and Program Evaluation office projects that the Navy will exceed the congressional cost cap by about $235 million. The Congressional Budget Office estimates for CVN 79 are even higher; at a total cost of over $12.5 billion—which, if realized, would be over $1 billion above the current congressional cost cap. Similar to CVN 78, the Navy is assuming the shipbuilder will achieve efficiency gains that are unprecedented in aircraft carrier construction.