Boeing Co. wants to build the Air Force's next bomber, and it's teaming up with one of its biggest rivals to do so.

Boeing and Lockheed Martin announced a partnership Friday to develop a next-generation bomber, bringing together the nation's two top defense contractors to put a major new plane in the sky by 2018.

Sharing expertise, both companies say, should help them win the job, worth tens of billions of dollars over the next decade, and help build the best warplane possible.

"This would be a far more competitive team together than going it alone," said Darryl Davis, president of Boeing Advanced Systems, a St. Louis-based unit that will be doing much of the upfront engineering work on the project. "We believe this is the most attractive and affordable way to put the best proposal on the table."

They're not yet sure what they will be proposing: The Air Force has said it wants a manned, subsonic bomber that can fly at least 2,000 miles, and wants it by 2018. But it hasn't issued specific requirements and could still change its mind. So until then, the Boeing-Lockheed team will study all sorts of possibilities.

"We're going to cover the waterfront," Davis said. "It could be manned. It could be unmanned. It could be optionally-manned."

A request for proposals is expected by late next year, and Air Force brass have said they will start funding development in their 2010 budget.

Until then, Boeing and Lockheed will foot their own bills, working to come up with plans and study possible solutions to the likely challenges of making what will be the most advanced bomber in the world.

Neither company would say how much they're spending. But the effort now is key, Davis said, if they hope to make a proposal quickly and launch production within a few years. To deliver planes by 2018, they'd have to start building by 2015.

If they win the contract, at least some manufacturing would likely take place in St. Louis, said Boeing spokesman Chris Haddox, though no decisions have yet been made about final assembly plants.

Boeing and Lockheed are expected to duel for the contract with Northrop Grumman, the country's third-biggest defense contractor and maker of the newest Air Force bomber, the Reagan-era B-2 Spirit.

In a statement, the Los Angeles-based company said it is "prepared to compete for any emerging program," and said it's also planning to upgrade the B-2 to meet future requirements.

But Northrop will have a hard time competing with the Boeing-Lockheed team, said Loren Thompson, a defense analyst at the Lexington Institute, a Washington area think tank. And the two companies complement each other.

"It's easy to understand the business logic of such a combination," Thompson said. "Lockheed is destined to be the only builder of fighters, and Boeing will probably be the only company producing large military planes. You put them together, and they'll be an unbeatable team."

Except for the B-2, Boeing has built every major Air Force bomber in the air, Thompson notes. And Lockheed has expertise in stealth and propulsion technologies that Boeing lacks.

"There are things Lockheed is doing in the classified world that make them a very valuable teammate," he said.

They've been quietly collaborating on the project for about a year, after Lockheed approached Boeing about a partnership, said Frank Cappuccio, executive vice president of Lockheed's "Skunk Works" advanced development program. The two companies also partner on the F-22 fighter jet, though Lockheed has about two-thirds of the work. On this project they plan a more even split.

"This arrangement is very different than what we've done in the past," Davis said. "It's not Boeing doing a wing to a Lockheed spec. It is a Boeing-Lockheed team working on this next-generation bomber as an integrated team."

How big a contract they're gunning for is still a bit unclear.

The Air Force has said it wants an "A" model of the bomber available by 2018, with more advanced versions in the decades to come. That first order will likely be for about 100 planes, said Thompson. Estimates run as high as $100 billion.

tlogan@post-dispatch.com | 314-340-8291