Buying a new jet fighter can be a long-drawn-out process. Brazil, after many years of planning and procrastination, has finally signed a contract for its future combat aircraft.

Officials from the Brazilian Defense Ministry’s Aeronautics Command and the Swedish Saab Group put pen to paper recently, and the Brazilian air force is now set to receive 36 Gripen NG fighters.

The jets, worth a little over $5.4 billion, include 28 single-seat Gripen Es and eight twin-seat Gripen F aircraft. Deliveries will begin in 2019 and will be completed in 2024.

The Força Aérea Brasileira badly needs new fighters. For the lead air arm of Latin America’s largest and most populous country, new equipment has been a long time coming.

While Brazil officially selected the single-engine Gripen on Dec. 18, 2013, the procurement program dates back to the mid-1990s. The FAB laid plans to license and locally assemble a foreign-made jet to replace its veteran French-built Mirage III fighters.

At the time, the government envisioned that Brazilian companies like Embraer and Aviabras would team up with a heavyweight like France’s Dassault or Sukhoi of Russia.