San Diego

National Steel & Shipbuilding has won a $34-million contract from the Naval Sea Systems Command to overhaul the guided missile cruiser Fox.

Nassco will use 200 newly hired employees and 150 existing employees to complete the overhaul, which will begin in October and run through September, 1990.

Nassco currently employs 2,600 workers. The shipbuilding and repair yard expects to have about 3,000 employees by year’s end. The new contract boosted Nassco’s order backlog to $450 million, according to Nassco spokesman Fred Hallett.

Until last month, the shipyard on San Diego Bay was a wholly owned subsidiary of Boise, Idaho-based Morrison-Knudson Co. Nassco’s employees and management on April 13 completed a buyout of the financially troubled yard. The purchase price was not released.

With the buyout, Nassco became an independent company based in San Diego. According to terms of the agreement, employees initially will own 80% of the company. Four senior executives will own the remainder of the company.

If stock options included in the agreement are exercised, senior executives eventually would own 35% of the company and employee ownership would fall to 35%. Morrison Knudson has retained an option to eventually acquire 20% of the new company.