1.

What is Obsolescence and provide some examples in a Malaysian context

According to the Defense Acquisition University’s Glossary of Defense Acquisition Acronyms

& Terms, 16th ed., obsolescence is a lack of availability of an item or raw material resulting
from statutory and process changes, as well as new designs. Obsolescence deals with the
process or condition by which a piece of equipment becomes no longer useful, or a form and
function no longer is currently available for production or repair (Department of Defense ,
2018).

1a Provide some examples in a Malaysian context

Within many organisations’ obsolescence management, if it is done at all, is done reactively.

It is very seldom part of the design, development and sustainment policy and certainly the
expenses of reactive obsolescence management are commonly unknown. Within the military
and most defence contractors’ obsolescence difficulties are generally solved serially within
projects, on an ad hoc basis, with no lessons learnt feedback to other parts of the system or
across the organisation.

This state of affairs arises as a direct result of the reactive nature of obsolescence
management with the difficulties mainly being discovered during repair in response to
equipment failure. At the time, the parts status is discovered it may be too late for last time
buys and the part is no longer available. Significant fee may then be involved in searching
for a comparable part or in the worst case having to redesign the system. The fact that an
equivalent part can be found may only offer a short-term resolution since the total parts
obsolescence status of other components on the board or other boards within the equipment
is not known (Smith, 2000).

The Royal Malaysian Air Force acquired the British BAE Hawk prototypes of ten (10) Hawk
108s and 18 Hawk 208s in the late 1990 replacing the old A-4 Skyhawk PTM. The BAE
Systems Hawk is a British single-engine, jet-powered advanced trainer aircraft. It has been
used in a training capacity and as a low-cost combat aircraft. (Wikipedia, 2019).

RMAF has an annual obsolescence conference between BAE Hawk/RMAF called

Obsolescence Working Group which redefines obsolescence as diminishing manufacturing
sources and material shortages (DMSMS). The DMSMS program seeks to mitigate the
effect of obsolescence on RMAF BAE Hawk 108/208 from acquisition through disposal.
Users can generate forecasting reports such as component health projections, create
current system and assembly health analysis, or project the health analysis 20 years out to
evaluate future obsolescence (BAE Systems, 2019).
2. Is a proactive approach to Obsolescence necessary?

Obsolescence management strategies of Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEM) can be

characterized within two dissimilar dominions: Proactive & Reactive ( SiliconExpert
Technologies, 2008).

Proactive approaches to obsolescence emphasis on forecasting component obsolescence

prior to the issuance of the Product Discontinuance Notice (PDN). OEMs adopting a
proactive passage to obsolescence management assign risk grades to each component and
have suitable measures in place to deal with the lifecycle alteration of a component in the
future. Such an approach permits the OEM to forecast lifecycle events long before a PDN is
ever issued, permitting time to commit resources, pursue for solutions and forecast cost
months or years in advance (Peter Sandborn, 2006).

Whereas a reactive approach to obsolescence management depends on acting once a

component event such as the release of a PDN has already taken place, advising the OEM
of an impending change in the component’s lifecycle. Reactive obsolescence management
is concerned with determining an appropriate, immediate resolution to the problem of
components becoming obsolete. Some of the mutual reactive strategies are lifetime buy,
bridge buy, purchasing parts from aftermarket sources, part replacement, emulation, and
reclamation.

In proactive management, steps are taken prior to actual obsolescence of a part. This
strategy is mainly used for critical parts that have high risk of becoming obsolete or if the
availability of the component is low after the part becomes obsolete. Proactive management
involves using forecasting methodology to predict obsolescence dates of various parts in a
product, analysing the risk of obsolescence of critical parts in a Bill of Material (BOM) and
then taking necessary steps to manage obsolescence (Reactive Obsolescence
Management, 2012).

2a Why can a purely reactive one not be used?

Most shared resolution strategies are reactive in nature, as these provide “quick-fix”
resolutions once the obsolescence has already befallen. There are a plenty of parties that
recommend applying proactive obsolescence management strategies in order to curtail the
risk of obsolescence and associated costs. However, it is vital to do the risk assessment of
all components in the Bill of Material (BOM), prior to choosing a reactive or proactive
strategy.

If obsolescence of a component has low impact on costs, then it may be prudent to use a
reactive strategy as these strategies are easier to implement. If the probability of
obsolescence is low and the impact is high costs, then it is advisable to use proactive
mitigation measures. If both the probability of obsolescence and impact costs are high, then
these components are regarded as ‘critical’ and hence, it is necessary to adopt a proactive
mitigation strategy (Pingle, 2015).

A reactive management would mean simply reacting to occurring issues: replace parts when
they are defective, check the availability of instrumentation when its phase-out is announced
and plan to implement a new automation system when the existing one fails.

This reactive management approach logically increases the risk of unexpected production/
operation/availability downtimes. Thus, it is highly not recommended a to opt for a purely
reactive approach for the entire set of instrumentation but maybe for those parts of it that
aren’t critical, comparatively cheap and alternative is easily available. It would be best to go
for an amalgamation of best practices that have proven to be easily realized and to generate
concrete advantages.

3. Consider the varying advantages and disadvantages of delivering OM

either through an “in-house” Malaysian Armed Forces solution or by using an
external commercial option, or gradual blend of two.

Obsolescence is progressively affecting Malaysian Armed Forces systems at a primary

phase of their life cycles. Availability of replacement parts is a high-risk for operational
readiness, but the wave of progress in electronics and material innovations in the past 10
years has speed-up parts obsolescence.

Old-style support choices are no longer effective in minimising the risk of obsolescence and
effect to the system’s cost and availability. It has become apparent that a more inclusive
approach is needed, where obsolescence management is performed from the planning to
retirement phase. During front-end planning, actions can be taken to anticipate
obsolescence issues and adjourn their onset in the life cycle of the system.

When planning for an Obsolescence Management, the MAF needs to decide whether to
outsource or to develop it in-house, both methods have their pros and cons and careful
consideration must be taken by the people responsible for such decision in order to choose
the implementation route that would best suit the MAF’s objective of addressing the
obsolescence issues.

Obsolescence management strategies can be considered and implemented on various

levels. The most effective management levels are related to engineering activities and
procurement. In order to implement an appropriate strategy, it is required to do an
assessment of the effect of the planned actions and the cost effectiveness thereof in the
specific life cycle phase of the product or system.
In order to ensure that obsolescence management is a key element considered within any
design, it is necessary to incorporate the concepts into the design of a product from its
earliest stages. In this way a pro-active approach, rather than a reactive approach is adopted
for obsolescence issues. In addition to this, it is becoming necessary in many areas of
industry where electronic products are being designed for a specific customer, that an
obsolescence management plan is required as part of the contract. (Obsolescence
Management Plan, electronicnotes)

Depending on the risk assessment related to the specific obsolescence issue, immediate
actions could be required to be implemented. If the risk is low, the obsolescence
management strategy could be to only monitor the situation and implement corrective
actions as and when required (reactive strategy). If the system or product is still in the early
stages of its lifecycle, then it could be money, and effort, well spent if a proactive
obsolescence management strategy is considered and implemented.

Hence, there are obviously strengths in each OM approach – organic and outsource.

Combo Approach OM

In order to effectively manage obsolescence issues and recognizing that it is the key
element to be considered within any design, it is necessary to incorporate the concepts into
the design of a product from its earliest stages. Accepting this concept and putting it as the
fundamental to addressing OM, the most cost-effective and efficacious approach is to adopt
a combo strategy.

It is mandatory for the MAF to investigate the obsolescence management prior to deciding
whether to manage it organically or outsource. This is the fundamental requirement that was
defined as providing guidance in planning a cost-effective obsolescence management
process that considers the essential factors to ensure that the product life cycle costs are
considered and applied.

First activities to plan should be the establishment and implementation of a work group or
teaming group to effectively address and manage obsolescence issues applicable to each of
the service’s environments. The military obsolescence teaming group should be a formalized
group of representatives from each service’s team.

Each individual service should have their dedicated team to enable a more focus and deeper
coverage.
 Advantages

This organic team will be able to establish the MAF’s objectives of forming the obsolescence
team (OT), develop an OM plan to address obsolescence related issues on all related
projects and be the moderator to the related industries to support the set objective.

The advantages to an in-house OM approach is:

a. Addressing OM at the earliest stage of its life – developing an OM Plan to pave as a

guidance to all.
b. Having a dedicated team to study/assess obsolescence issues all the time to
determine an appropriate, immediate resolution to the problem of components becoming
obsolete.
c. A thorough and deeper coverage of OM issues for the MAF as they understand better
and get more information from within their own establishment.
d. Save cost in implementing the reactive OM for low cost and non-critical items.
e. MAF would have their own database of all critical and non-critical items. This would
enable MAF to prompt for both proactive and reactive OM approaches based on data
collected.
f. Monitoring of OM data throughout the item’s operational life
g. Shouldering a lesser risk by addressing the OM issues at a very early stage and
monitoring it during its operational period
h. Purchasing activities could be triggered in response to reactive approach to OM based
on the database bank.
i. Forecasting methodology to predict obsolescence dates could be generated via the
database bank to activate proactive OM strategy.
j. Collaboration with related industries could be established at the beginning of the OM
program of each item.

Disadvantages

Despite the advantages of having an in-house OM team, there are also disadvantages.

1. MAF has to allocated manpower to form up a dedicated OM team.

2. Budget allocation for the team, assets and activities formation and operational needs.
3. Consistent training which involves budget should be allocated to maintain the team
members competencies.
4. How do you reconcile the needs of IT security with the OM needs for an
integrated transfer and storage of data between internal and external sources?

The effects of the computer and the Internet revolution go far beyond their direct uses and
these effects are profound. Good security policy and its effective implementation minimize
the risk of accidental and deliberate losses, makes intrusions more difficult, and provides the
tools to identify attacks and to repair security breaches.

While security is important for everyone, it is of special importance for small and medium
enterprises in developing countries. The rewards of being able to move into global markets
with the assistance of ICTs can be significant, but the risks of doing so in an insecure
manner are substantial.

In small organizations, provisions for IT security may also be quite simple, with each person
holding responsibility for his or her own computer and files. However, for somewhat larger
groups, groups that are engaged in commercial transactions, or groups that maintain
confidential data for customers or public citizens, the need to establish formal security
policies and procedures becomes more important.

The Information Security Forum (ISF, 2003) defines information security awareness as the
degree or extent to which every member of staff understands the importance of information
security, the levels of information security appropriate to the organisation, their individual
security responsibilities, and acts accordingly (H.A. Kruger, 2006).

Information Technology Security also known as, IT Security is the process of implementing
measures and systems designed to securely protect and safeguard information (business
and personal data, voice conversations, still images, motion pictures, multimedia
presentations, including those not yet conceived) utilizing various forms of technology
developed to create, store, use and exchange such information against any unauthorized
access, misuse, malfunction, modification, destruction, or improper disclosure, thereby
preserving the value, confidentiality, integrity, availability, intended use and its ability to
perform their permitted critical functions (SANS Institute, 2019).

Security professionals in MAF are to assist the organization to decide how much time and
money need to be spent on security. Another part of the job is to make sure that MAF has
policies, guidelines, and procedures in place so that the money spent is spent well. And
finally, they need to audit the system to ensure that the appropriate controls are
implemented correctly to achieve the policy’s goals. Thus, practical security is really a
question of management and administration more than it is one of technical skill (Alan
Greenberg, 2003).
MAF has to have security planning in place which may be divided into five distinct steps
(Alan Greenberg, 2003):

a. Planning to address MAF security needs,

b. Conducting a risk assessment or adopting best practices,
c. Creating policies to reflect MAF needs,
d. Implementing security,
e. Performing audit and incident response.

Whilst information security generally focuses on shielding the confidentiality, integrity and
availability of information, information security awareness deals with the use of security
awareness programs to create and maintain security-positive behaviour as a critical element
in an effective information security environment.

According to Hansche (2001: p. 14) the goal of a security awareness program is to amplify
the importance of information systems security and the possible negative effects of a
security breach or failure.

MAF needs to address the information security awareness issue that is most commonly
regarded as aiming at improving information security by (Designing a Security Awareness
Program: Part 1, 2001):

a. enhancing the adoption of security policies and countermeasures,

b. improving information security users' security behaviour, or
c. altering work routine so as to apply good security habits.

5. Present a convincing argument with advantages and disadvantages to

your Command as to why the cost of implementing an OM process will
represent a Value for Money solution both in terms of material reliability and
operational capability.

It has become vital to embrace obsolescence management within planning activities from
the earliest life cycle phases. Realizing an obsolescence management could be
characterized as strategic obsolescence management when obsolescence management is
planned and implemented during the early life cycle phases (IEC, 2019).

One of the most essential features of a system is its reliability. Systems can operate without
intrusion for many years, however, this can lead to a hidden issue. When an issue occurs
and an affected part has become obsolete, it can be a challenge to search for a replacement
or get that part fixed.
Systems with short lifespans which are easily replaced and upgraded, may never get to the
stage where obsolescence becomes an issue, but for ever reliable (and expensive) systems,
it is a real issue that is increasing over time and waiting to catch operators.

Having an Obsolescence Management Team

The benefit of having the support of an obsolescence management team to find the most
cost-effective technical solution for obsolescence problems has been effectively
demonstrated by various case studies.

The Component Obsolescence Teaming Group (COTG) [9,14] should be a formalized group
of representatives from military programmes/projects and related industries that work
together to share solutions and strategies to resolve common component obsolescence
problems. By working together to resolve obsolescence issues, military projects and industry
can save both time and money by consolidating their requirements and by sharing the cost
of implementing such resolutions. The COTG should maintain a database of current
information on component obsolescence and, whenever possible, explore resolutions that
would work for all related programmes or systems.

Joining an external obsolescence-teaming group largely enhances the ability to address

obsolescence issues more cost-effectively (A. Meyer, 2003),

Managing Obsolescence to Reduce Risks

The risks lingering obsolescence of in-service systems can be significantly reduced through
effective obsolescence management. Obsolescence management, if done appropriately,
will not cost money but will save money. Costs will be saved many times over through
avoiding issues ever happening, reduced downtime if failures do occur and extending the life
of the equipment, which means not having to upgrade full systems before it is really
necessary.

Implement an Operational Management System (OMS)

An Operational Management System (OMS) is vital for reliability and obsolescence

management of a system during the support phase as it provides the visibility structures of
failure and repair effectiveness trends. Failure trends can be analysed and where required
correction actions can be taken by means of changes or upgrades via the formal engineering
change proposal process (ECP).
Halliday (B.R.Halliday, 1984) states that; “at the centre of the reliability growth process is the
identification of failure mechanisms by testing, and their elimination through design and
hardware modification actions”.

An OMS is an excellent support management tool that allows for effective closing of the
management loop to enable the identification and quantification of problem areas and
trends. This is significantly important for effective obsolescence management during the in-
support phase. The OMS must effectively identify, quantify and assess the trend as well as
define the effect of any fix that has been implemented (Rooney, 2015).

6. Brief your staff on the requirements of a new OM team justifying each

position of its rank, skill-set, branch specialisation and experience.

With the increased use of commercial parts in military systems it has become essential to
include obsolescence management within the programme plans from the earliest stages.
The management of obsolescence is essential to achieve optimum cost effectiveness
throughout the whole product life cycle. The importance of obsolescence management is to
provide contract requirements and guidance in planning a cost effective obsolescence
management process, which takes into account the essential factors to ensure that the
Product’s life cycle costs are considered and applied (Ministry of Defence UK, 2001).

First activities to plan should be the establishment and implementation of a work group or
teaming group and to structure or re-organize existing project teams to effectively address
and manage obsolescence problems applicable to their projects or environments.

Teaming groups normally have the benefit of a comprehensive database, wider engineering
and obsolescence case resolution experience, and more influence on component
manufacturer and supplier communities.

The purpose of obsolescence management planning is to provide guidance in planning a

cost-effective obsolescence management process that takes into account the essential
factors to ensure that the product life cycle costs are considered and applied. The first
activities to plan are the establishment and implementation of a workgroup or teaming group
and also to structure or re-organize existing project teams to effectively address and manage
obsolescence problems applicable to their projects or environments (Ministry of Defence,
UK, 2001).
Establish and implement a Component Obsolescence Teaming Group (COTG)

The Component Obsolescence Teaming Group (COTG) is a formalized group of

representatives from military programmes/projects and the related industries that work
together to share solutions and strategies to resolve common component obsolescence
problems. A COTG is an efficient, effective way to address component obsolescence issues.

Establish and implement the Project Team

The Project Team is normally the members of the project or programme as applicable to any
project/programme depending on the life cycle phase of the project/programme e.g.
development phase or stable support phase. A dedicated Project manager or Programme
manager will always head this team.

The Project Team will appoint a dedicated person to be responsible for managing or
coordinating of the related project obsolescence issues and to support the project or
programme during applicable resolution investigations and implementation there off.

The Project team will work together to support specific project or programme goals and will
also support activities to develop and implement solutions and strategies to resolve common
component obsolescence problems.

Develop an Obsolescence Management Plan (OMP)

At the earliest stages of a project the Project manager should produce an outline
Obsolescence Management plan (OMP). The plan should be subject to planned reviews and
updates and form part of or be specifically referenced in the Through Life Management Plan
(TLMP) or the Product Support Plan (PSP).

Obsolescence Management Organisation

The plan should be properly resourced to ensure that the activities detailed by the plan can
be undertaken and managed. The plan should include detail of the organisation and
individuals that will be/are responsible for the conduct of the activities listed by the plan.

The Obsolescence Team will dedicate effort to monitor specific ‘at risk’ items and provide
advice and guidance to the Operator on all matters concerning obsolescence concerns and
issues regarding the equipment.

a. Product Program Manager

i. Appointing an OM Manager or someone responsible for OM within the Product
b. Product Obsolescence Manager - Responsible for management of obsolescence
issues within a product.
 i. Background / Experience: A technical/engineering work experience is fundamental
to ensuring an understanding of the requirements for design, manufacture and support.
c. Purchasing
i. Negotiating with tier suppliers to ensure the requirements for OM is flowed down
and defined within the terms and conditions included in the placement of purchase
orders.
d. Support
i. Liaison with the other functional units in reaching a resolution agreement that is
practical to support once a product has been delivered.
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