Yes, and if I may just give a bit of an opener, we're three years into a 30-year strategy. This is the biggest project, as you noted. The budget is $26 billion for up to 15 ships.
As my colleague pointed out, we recently announced a procurement strategy that in our view is going to maximize competition. We've had 15 industry engagement sessions to get a better idea of Canadian capacity, what designs are out there, seeing where it's possible to buy off the shelf so that we don't spend wasted months in a competition when in fact there are existing designs available to meet Canada's needs, but also assessing where there's Canadian capacity not just to contribute on this project but also to become part of a global supply chain and supply worldwide.
We announced the procurement strategy on May 13, and over the course of the summer we're going to be talking to firms, as my colleague mentioned, to see which firms have built designs before and have proven capacity in this area, and then we'll be running a competitive process in the fall for combat systems integrators and warship designers.
I would highlight, as was noted earlier, that the ship is one thing, but the real complexity now is what's on the ship, all of the complex systems to allow them to integrate with satellites, with radars, and to have interoperability with our allies. That's where there's a lot of value; that, plus in-service support.
One reason we want to use competition throughout the process is that the first ship might not look like the last one. These are going to evolve over time, taking advantage of innovations, of reduction in prices that we should see as benefits over time, and quite frankly, also the shipbuilding expertise that will develop in Canada.