Introducing our new podcast series: “Accelerating Productivity through Digital Transformation”

Have you heard about our podcast Talking Aerospace Today? It’s creating a nice buzz throughout the A&D industry. Produced by the Siemens Aerospace and Defense Industry team, it goes to the heart of what’s happening inside our industry today.

This latest addition to the Talking Aerospace Today podcast is a series called “Accelerating Productivity through Digital Transformation” and I hope you’ll find each episode fascinating and quite revealing as we dive into a variety of topics affecting our industry. This first episode touches on the many trends the aerospace and defense industry face and how these trends impact productivity.

Listen to episode #1 here:

So what is productivity in this age of digital transformation? …How are today’s trends impacting productivity? …And what can A&D companies do to usher in a new era of productivity? To answer these questions let’s take a look at the trends shaping the industry.

Aerospace and Defense trends today

Most companies today are challenged to bring new products to market faster while meeting technical, cost and schedule commitments. Processes used just a few years ago no longer suffice today.

“Processes used just a few years ago no longer suffice today.”

During this time of unprecedented innovation to achieve higher performance, we’re seeing increased program complexity and the growing need for higher levels of integration across domains. At the same time, OEM and suppliers need to get to market faster than their competitors at a lower cost.

This rising complexity is partially due to increased electrification – whether it’s for green aircraft solutions with electric propulsion, or electronic vertical takeoff and lift (eVTOL) aircraft. Companies also are trying to improve the efficiency, reliability and maintainability of their aircraft by switching from mechanical systems, like a hydraulic or a pneumatic system, to electrical systems.

Finally, companies face a growing trend toward the globalization of aerospace supply chains and their workforce. Companies now rely more on global partnerships, while the workforce itself works more remotely. OEMs have challenges within their own teams on how to collaborate more effectively, putting pressure on their program execution performance.

Gaining the competitive advantage

Although these trends and challenges can seem daunting, forward-looking aerospace companies are embracing digital transformation. Digitalization helps them innovate while dramatically cutting costs and schedules. To turn complexity into a competitive advantage. Digital transformation centers on the imperative of having a comprehensive digital twin of your product, your production process, and even how the product will be supported over its lifetime. A digital twin offers a rich, robust understanding of how your product operates by modeling the complete system and supporting virtual verification and virtual manufacturing enabling you to go faster and innovate more while taking the risk out of your program.

The comprehensive digital twin is only possible with modern, adaptable and highly personalized solutions across design, manufacturing and lifecycle. This requires a rapid application development environment to enable highly configurable systems that can be quickly tailored and deployed.

And finally, a flexible, open environment is needed to incorporate the latest technology. Many companies have tools that have made them successful. In a flexible, open environment it is much easier to incorporate the latest technology, as opposed to being forced to use only those toolsets that work in a closed environment.

So the three keys to a competitive advantage for a company are the digital twin, supported by personal adaptable solutions, within a flexible and open environment.

Program execution excellence – why not at your company?

Siemens Xcelerator portfolio comes in. It’s a portfolio of services, software solutions, cloud applications and IIoT capabilities – along with low-code application development – all focused on optimizing program execution and productivity.

It’s about developing and certifying products faster with less risk, speeding production ramp-up, getting to your revenues faster, and improving product support while reducing operational costs for customers. It’s about getting to market faster with higher-performing products.

This is just the first in a series of five podcasts focused on A&D productivity. In episode two, I’ll be talking about Model Based Systems Engineering or MBSE. Systems engineering is at the core of many new programs starting today. It’s that important. It’s about orchestrating your technical program and working more efficiently and collaborating better.

For information on all our industry solutions, please visit our Aerospace & Defense website.

Thanks for taking the time. Now please, go ahead and listen to the actual podcast.

Dale Tutt is the Vice President of Aerospace and Defense Industry for Siemens Digital Industries Software. He is responsible for defining overall the overall Aerospace and Defense industry strategy for Siemens Digital Industries Software, driving specific industry requirements into solutions for Aerospace and Defense customers. Dale has over 30 years of experience in engineering design, development and program leadership within the Aerospace industry.