CANBERRA, Australia Australia has announced that a French company DCNS had beat bidders from Japan and Germany to build its next generation of submarines DCNS, German's ThysennKrupp Marine Systems and Japan's Mitsubishi were in the running to build 12 conventional submarines that the Australian navy expects will cost at least 56 billion Australian dollars ($43 billion). Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said Tuesday that the DCNS bid met Australia's unique requirements. The Japanese bid appeared to be the early favorite in the bidding process in what would have been Japan's first fully fledged military technology transfer since World War II.