Boeing [BA] has formally snagged two major foreign orders for military planes: F-15QA fighters for Qatar and a KC-46 tanker for Japan.
The Pentagon announced Dec. 22 that Boeing was awarded a $6.2 billion contract to build 36 F-15QAs for the Qatar Emiri Air Force by the end of 2022. The F-15QA will be the Qatari version of the Advanced F-15, a new, upgraded variant of the F-15.
The award came a little more than a year after the U.S. government indicated it had approved the sale of up to 72 F-15QAs to Qatar.
Also on Dec. 22, the Pentagon and Boeing announced that the company received a $279 million contract to give the Japan Air Self-Defense Force its first KC-46 plus logistics support, marking the tanker’s first international sale. Japan picked the KC-46 in October 2015 after holding a competition.
Japan is expected to buy a total of at least four KC-46s over several years, supplementing its existing fleet of four Boeing KC-767J tankers. Company officials hope that the Japan sale will spur other countries to buy the KC-46.
Boeing is developing the KC-46A for the U.S. Air Force, which plans to buy 179 jets. The first of those planes began flight testing in December 2017.