The FREMM (French: Frégate Européenne Multi-Mission; Italian: Fregata Europea Multi-Missione), which stands for "European multi-purpose frigate", is a Franco-Italian family of multi-purpose frigates designed by Naval Group and Fincantieri. In France, this surface combatant is known as the "Aquitaine class" (17 units planned, of which 9 were later cancelled), while in Italy it is known as the "Bergamini class" (10 units planned). The lead ship of the class, , was commissioned in November 2012 by the French Navy. Italy has ordered six general purpose and four anti-submarine variants. France, on the other hand, has ordered six anti-submarine variants and two air-defense ones. The FREMM has also been exported to various countries. Notably, the United States Navy selected a FREMM variant for their new of 20 frigates, to be built by Fincantieri, starting with a $795 million contract for the lead ship. Background Three original variants of the FREMM were proposed; an anti-submarine variant (ASW) and a general-purpose variant (GP) and a land-attack variant (AVT) to replace the existing classes of frigates within the French and Italian navies. A total of 27 FREMM were to be constructed (17 for France and 10 for Italy) with additional aims to seek exports. However, budget cuts and changing requirements saw this number drop significantly for France, while the order for Italy remained unchanged. The land-attack variant (AVT) was subsequently cancelled. A third anti-air warfare variant of FREMM was proposed by DCNS in response to French requirements for a new air-defence frigate, the new variant became known as FREDA ("FREgates de Défense Aériennes", "Air defence frigate"). This new French requirement was due to the third and fourth s being cancelled after the first two cost €1.35B each, but this decision left French Navy still in-need of replacements for its ageing air-defence frigates. As of 2009, the FREDA design features a more powerful version of the Héraklès passive electronically scanned array radar and 32 cells of SYLVER A50 vertical launch system in place of the 16 cells of A43 and 16 cells of A70. The SYLVER A50 would allow it to fire the -range Aster 30 missile. While at one point it was determined that the towed array sonar would not be fitted, this has subsequently been retained on the FREDA design. At Euronaval 2012 DCNS showed a new concept called FREMM-ER for the FREDA requirement, again based on the FREMM, but specifically mentioning the ballistic