Strategies to the Prediction, Mitigation and Management of Product Obsolescence

10.2 HELPFUL ORGANIZATIONS FOR OBSOLESCENCE MANAGEMENT

Private firms, organizations, official state-owned departments, and universities can provide help and database services for obsolescence management. Some of these are described in the following sections.

10.2.1 U.S. Department of Defense (DoD)

The U.S. DoD and other defense procurement agencies worldwide have a strong interest in parts obsolescence. The response of DoD has been to actively promote a transition to commercial items by instituting a sweeping acquisition reform program. In the U.S., the DoD’s guidance on obsolescence management for military program managers is contained within the U.S. DoD Defense Acquisition Deskbook (U.S. DoD, 2002b). In addition, the U.S. DoD is sponsoring a number of research projects. For example, the U.S DoD sponsored projects through the U.S. Air Force MANTECH program aimed at providing either guidance documents or software tools (U.S. DoD, 2001a; Bumbalough, 1999).

Military electronics manufacturers supplying parts to specifications MIL-PRF-38535 (MIL-PRF-38535, 1989), MIL-PRF-38534D (MIL-PRF-38534D, 1999), and MIL-PRF-19500 (MIL-PRF-19500M, 1999) have required stricter change-notification procedures. They are based on the Qualified Manufacturers List (QML) and Government Industry Data Exchange Program (GIDEP). QML dictates change-notification and test requirements, and GIDEP serves as a recommended path for change-notification.

QML establishes the general performance requirements for semiconductor ...