South Korea Signs Destroyer Contract Ending Three-Year Shipbuilder Dispute
South Korea's arms procurement agency has signed a contract with Hanwha Ocean for the detailed design and construction of the first KDDX next-generation destroyer, ending nearly three years of dispute over which shipbuilder should receive the work. The lead ship is to be delivered to the South Korean Navy by the end of 2032. The Defense Acquisition Program Administration said the class will be the country's first large destroyer built with a domestically developed hull, combat management system, multifunction radar and other core weapons systems.
The contract for the detailed design and lead vessel is valued at approximately 882.1 billion won, around 617 million dollars. The entire programme, including five further destroyers, is expected to cost about 7.8 trillion won, or roughly 5.46 billion dollars. The government has not determined which companies will build the follow-on ships or how those contracts will be awarded, leaving open the possibility that the competition reopens for the bulk of the programme's value.
The path to signature was unusually contentious. Hanwha Ocean, formerly Daewoo Shipbuilding and Marine Engineering, completed the conceptual design, while HD Hyundai Heavy Industries later carried out the basic design, creating an expectation that it would receive a negotiated contract for the detailed design and lead ship. Hanwha Ocean instead pressed for competitive bidding, citing a military-secrets case involving HD Hyundai employees who had been convicted of photographing or improperly handling classified material related to the programme. The agency accepted that request and ran a competition in which the two yards were separated by less than 0.6 of a point, with a 1.2-point security penalty applied to HD Hyundai considered decisive. Hanwha Ocean was selected as preferred bidder on 11 June, and a challenge from its rival was rejected in early July.
The ship itself is expected to displace about 7,000 tonnes lightly loaded, larger than the navy's Chungmugong Yi Sun-sin class but smaller than the Sejong the Great and Jeongjo the Great classes that carry the American Aegis system. Although often described as a Korean-style Aegis destroyer, it is not expected to use that system, instead combining a domestic integrated combat system with an indigenous phased-array radar. The design features a low-observable hull form and integrated mast, a five-inch naval gun and Korean vertical launch systems capable of carrying surface-to-air, anti-ship, land-attack and anti-submarine weapons, with the number of cells not officially confirmed.
Major systems including the combat management system, sonar, radar and ship-launched surface-to-air missiles will be developed domestically, and the navy plans to apply technologies matured since the basic design was completed, among them digital-twin construction methods and layered counter-drone defences. Integrated electric propulsion is under consideration to reduce noise, and automation should cut crew numbers relative to older classes. The dispute cost the programme roughly two years, and both the agency and the shipbuilder will need to compress the schedule to hold the 2032 date.
