DoD Acts to Ensure Spare Part Pipeline

The Defense Department, in an attempt to ensure access to obsolete parts, will continue work on its web-based tracking system of spare parts.

The program is called the “Diminished Manufacturing Sources Shared Data Warehouse” program and is meant to link different sources of information about obsolete parts, declining manufacturing sources and material shortages.

The Defense Logistics Agency recently issued a sole-source justification for continuing the project so that weapons systems would continue to be viable by having spare parts available.

The DoD is worried about rare earth materials used in electronic components at the heart of advanced weapon systems and chip makers who have shifted their operations to Asia.

Concurrent Technologies Corp. is the only company that has been working on the project since the late 1990s.