Lifecycle Assurance is the PLUS - A letter from the CEO

Recently, I consulted with a business aircraft maker on an End-of-Life (EOL) crisis event his team was facing. A system supplier couldn’t find a handful of critical EOL’d electronics components. After some weeks of crisis meetings and a few cross-country flights, the supplier was “amazingly” able to find the parts. Crisis overcome.

But even with a successful outcome, it’s a great example of the fundamental problem we all face concerning electronics obsolescence: Fundamental changes in the marketplace have made old ways of sustaining older systems obsolete.

Thirty years ago, there were fewer COTs board competitors—meaning board Original Equipment Manufactures (OEMs) could EOL products and pressure customers to upgrade without much risk of a customer switching. However, today’s competitive landscape compels OEMs to respond to “another Last Time Buy (LTB)”—even though the opportunity cost makes the work unprofitable.

Twenty years ago, there was a less diverse set of active electronics components, and they were manufactured in volume for a long time, making it easier for board OEMs to find components on the grey market. However, in today’s M&A landscape where component EOLs and counterfeits run rampant, finding good parts bogs down every team involved in manufacturing, not just procurement.

Ten years ago, at the start of the Great Recession, there was a huge overcapacity in the marketplace, meaning board OEMs were desperate for every revenue dollar they could get. However, in today’s surging economy with pressure to quickly introduce A LOT of new products, the effort to quote low-volume RFQs and manage longevity agreements undermines most companies’ priorities.

Overreliance on these and other traditional reactive solutions guarantees the industry will continue to encounter these problems.

At GDCA, we’ve experienced our fair share of issues from our own overreliance on reactive solutions, which is why we’ve shifted our entire mind-set away from sustainment—and toward the idea of assurance.

Assurance recognizes that all program and product managers want from their suppliers is quality and affordability. Reactive solutions deliver the total opposite. Assurance programs focus on satisfying equipment programs’ longevity needs until the equipment is no longer needed. Reactive solutions focus on crisis events.

Product lifecycle management (PLM) doesn’t address longevity, but PLM “Plus” does. When it comes to effective PLM, Assurance is the Plus.