KBR Inc. (KBR) just secured a highly competitive spot on one of the Pentagon's biggest defense programs. The company announced Wednesday it won a position on the Missile Defense Agency's Scalable Homeland Innovative Enterprise Layered Defense contract, better known by its appropriately defensive acronym: SHIELD.
The numbers here are eye-catching. This multiple-award, indefinite delivery, indefinite quantity contract carries a ceiling value of $151 billion. The program's designed to do what defense contracts always promise to do, but faster: get innovative missile defense capabilities to the warfighter with greater speed and flexibility.
What KBR Actually Gets to Do
The SHIELD award gives KBR access to mission areas spanning basically every domain you can think of: land, sea, air, space, and cyberspace. The company says its systems engineering and integration background positions it to speed up deployment timelines, cut costs, and deliver scalable solutions that reinforce layered defense architectures. That's defense-speak for building systems that work together to stop missiles at different stages.
Why This Matters
Mark Kavanaugh, KBR's President of Defense, Intelligence and Space, emphasized the company's role in the Golden Dome for America initiative. "We are proud to collaborate with the Missile Defense Agency to support its next generation missile defense mission, its critical role under the Golden Dome for America initiative, and other Department of War organizations who also have the ability to utilize this contract for requirements that fall within scope," he said.
Kavanaugh added that the win "highlights KBR's role as a technology leader and architecture design agent, delivering advanced defense solutions, digital engineering and AI-enabled capabilities that ensure mission success for the warfighter."
The Technical Arsenal
KBR brings decades of missile defense system experience to the table, working across both classified and unclassified environments. The company's approach integrates commercial and non-commercial technologies with artificial intelligence, machine learning, digital engineering, open systems architectures, virtual prototyping, model-based systems engineering, and agile processes. Translation: modern tech methods applied to accelerate how quickly advanced defense systems get developed, deployed, and maintained.
KBR shares climbed 2.34% to $44.00 in premarket trading Wednesday following the announcement.