July 27 is potentially a historic day for Davie Canada, as the National Shipbuilding Procurement Strategy Secretariat announced that it had accepted the application for a change of bidder received from 7731299 Canada Inc. (Davie Canada) on July 21, 2011.
According to the secretariat's official release, "the application and all supporting documentation were received before bids closed on July 21, 2011, and the application met all the legal and experience qualification criteria and contained all other attestations required in the original Solicitation of Interest and Qualification issued in September 2010."
This makes the race for the $33b contract officially a three-way race, with bids from Davie Canada, Irving Shipbuilding of Halifax and B.C.'s Seaspan Marine Corp., owner of Vancouver Shipyards, Vancouver Drydock and Victoria Shipyard.
Each shipyard has the backing of their respective provincial governments, all hoping to see thousands of new jobs created as well as billions of dollars invested in economies. One of the shipyards will be chosen to build combat vessels and one to build non-combat ships.