War Contracts

CAE USA Awarded $11.1 Million Navy Deal to Train Australian Seahawk Crews

The Tampa-based simulation specialist received an $11.1 million modification to sustain Royal Australian Navy MH-60R training in Nowra, funded entirely through Foreign Military Sales.

First Published: August 3, 2026, 1:26 PM ET

TAMPA, FLORIDA — CAE USA Inc., the Tampa-based provider of military simulation and training, received an $11.1 million Navy contract modification to keep Australia’s Seahawk helicopter crews trained through 2027, as announced on war.gov.

The firm-fixed-price, cost-reimbursable modification exercises Option Year One and carries a value of $11,135,132, the Navy said in its August 3, 2026 contract announcement. Foreign Military Sales customer funds covered the full amount at the time of the award, none of which expire at the end of the current fiscal year. The Navy did not compete the contract, N6134025C0002.

The work supports Royal Australian Navy MH-60R training facilities at Albatross, Nowra, New South Wales, inside the Seahawk Simulation and Warfare Centre. The scope covers contractor operation and maintenance services, contract engineering support, courseware revision, contractor instructor services, cyber sustainment and configuration management. Crews will train in Nowra through the expected completion in August 2027.

The award reinforces a defense relationship between Washington and Canberra built around shared aircraft and interoperable crews. Australia flies the MH-60R Seahawk, the same anti-submarine and anti-surface helicopter that serves the U.S. Navy, and Foreign Military Sales routes an allied government’s money through the Pentagon’s procurement system. Australian taxpayers foot the bill, while a U.S. contractor sustains the training pipeline and American shipyards and vendors keep a foothold in the platform’s global support base.

CAE combines nearly 80 years of innovation with a workforce of approximately 13,000 employees across around 240 sites and training locations in more than 40 countries, according to tampabaychamber.com. The company broke ground on its Tampa International Airport headquarters in 2017, a campus that grew to include a 102,000-square-foot training facility and a 133,000-square-foot home office, according to spaceflorida.gov.

The modification marks the second contract awarded to CAE USA in 2026, lifting the company’s total contract value for the year to $269.0 million. It ranks as the 56th Department of Defense contract booked in Florida during 2026. The award trails the firm’s record contract of $257.9 million and sits well below the year-to-date maximum of $8 billion in the Navy portfolio, though it clears the portfolio’s year-to-date minimum of $9.0 million.

For the average American reader, the deal costs nothing directly, because an allied government funds it. The arrangement instead sustains U.S. defense jobs in Florida and deepens ties with a Pacific partner at a moment of rising naval competition in the region.

This has happened before. CAE has held the Australian MH-60R training work under the same contract number, and this modification extends rather than reopens the arrangement. Repeated option-year exercises are routine in long-run simulation and sustainment programs, where governments prize continuity of instructors and courseware over recompetition.

Naval Air Warfare Center Training Systems Division in Orlando, Florida, serves as the contracting activity and will manage future decisions on the program. The Navy did not announce a date for exercising any additional option years.

Foreign military training ties between the United States and Australia stretch back generations. Australian and American forces have fought side by side in every major conflict since World War I, from the Western Front in 1918 to the beaches of the Pacific in 1942, when U.S. and Australian troops halted the Japanese advance in the Kokoda Track campaign and at the Battle of the Coral Sea. Those shared campaigns hardened into formal alliance with the ANZUS Treaty signed in 1951, a pact that endures and underpins deals like the Seahawk training work sustained today.

This contract represents the 2nd contract awarded to CAE USA Inc., in 2026, bringing the company’s total contract value for the year to $269,021,265. It is also the 56th Department of Defense contract awarded in Florida during 2026. While this is not the largest contract ever awarded to CAE USA Inc., whose record stands at $257,886,133, it is notable within the Navy portfolio. Specifically, it falls between the 2026 Navy portfolio’s year-to-date minimum of $9,046,496 and maximum of $8,000,000,000. Overall, this award was announced among 8 Department of Defense contracts issued nationwide on August 3, 2026.