“First, we expect F-35 18/19 to be awarded this year, maintaining program funding and continuity.”

In context

“ade towards delivering full combat capability. We're holding our free cash flow expectation in the range of $6 billion to $6.3 billion, which absorbs a potential unfavorable impact from longer deferrals of final F-35 delivery payments. This is made possible by proactive actions taken across the company to offset these potential headwinds. On the cash deployment side, we still expect over $3 billion of IR&D and capital investments, while the dividend, along with the expected $4 billion of share repurchases, maintain attractive shareholder returns. Lastly, on backlog, we continue to expect backlog to grow in 2024 even with the higher sales outlook, which provides a line of sight to future growth. Before I wrap, I'd like to highlight a few other key assumptions regarding the updated outlook. First, we expect F-35 18/19 to be awarded this year, maintaining program funding and continuity. Second, we continue to expect $325 million of losses on the MFC classified program, of which $100 million has been recognized year-to-date. And third, this outlook does not assume any pension contributions in 2024. So in summary on Chart 12, our solid first half results give us confidence in raising the full year outlook for sales, profit and EPS, while holding the cash flow outlook, reflecting our ongoing efforts to deliver predictable, and improving operating and financial performance as is expected of us. It all starts with a relentless focus on executing to our programmatic commitments and delivering critical 21st Century security mission capabilities where we strive to continuously improve. To that end, we are investing in our people, processes and systems through the 1LMX transforma”