Seems to me the suits running aerospace companies all have something in common.
They have no idea.
It's all dollars, cents and stocks to them.
Ummm, why are they in business? Why is anyone in business? Making quality/cheap fighter planes is not the number 1 reason.
More pertinent question is to ask why our government allows itself to get into this situation. The aerospace companies (like most defence companies) have to play the silly games invented by pollies and organisations like DMO. In this case, with no competitive tender - why does anyone think we'd get anything that remotely represented value?