Obsolescence management
Keeping a capability supportable as its components, suppliers and technologies age out.
Obsolescence management is the discipline of keeping a capability operational as the components, sub-suppliers and technologies inside it go out of production. Defence systems serve for decades; the electronics inside them rarely do. Managed well, obsolescence is planned around, with component roadmaps, mid-life updates and support arrangements agreed at purchase. Ignored, it quietly turns a fleet into a source of spare parts.
How this plays out in programmes
Defence systems serve for decades, but the electronics inside them rarely do, and ignored, obsolescence quietly turns a fleet into a source of spare parts. Planning around it means watching component roadmaps, catching last-time-buy notices, and deciding whether to stockpile, re-host or re-buy while there is still time. That planning is a buyer discipline, and the sooner it starts the cheaper it is. Where Unstrat delivers concretely is the engineering end of the problem: reverse-engineering and rebuilding the dying automated test benches a depot depends on, so a fleet keeps being certified as its components and technologies age out. Doing that work in region keeps the buyer's support independent of a distant supplier's willingness to keep old lines running. The advantage is sustained availability: a fleet that keeps serving the mission rather than degrading into cannibalisation. The Obsolescence management capability page sets out how to think about the wider problem, from DMSMS planning and last-time-buy decisions to the choice between re-hosting an obsolete assembly and re-buying a modern equivalent, and what the test-bench rebuild capability actually covers. Localisation arrangements are scoped per programme, subject to export controls and end-use approvals, so the buyer retains the ability to keep capability alive on their own terms.