Best Practices for Managing Component Obsolescence in Aerospace Electronics

Extending the life of aerospace equipment goes hand-in-hand with proactive planning for future component transitions. Just as electric vehicles (EVs) have evolved to incorporate components and features once exclusive to consumer electronics, aerospace systems may eventually follow suit—adopting smaller, more powerful, and more sustainable parts.

While aerospace maintains a much higher degree of regulatory compliance, the industry can at least expect a shift towards new parts with more sustainable, recyclable materials, and that can withstand the same rigorous environments in smaller packages. To stay ahead of the curve, aerospace companies need a dual strategy: prolonging the life of current systems to reduce costs, while actively planning their transition to future technologies.

However, each side to the strategy comes with its own risks and costs, encouraging aerospace procurement to weigh-up all the available options. Here I’ll be detailing the unique challenges to aerospace and the ongoing back and forth to protect and develop systems.

The Nuances of PCB Obsolescence in Aerospace

Aerospace systems are, by design, designed for longevity and high reliability throughout their lifecycles. Contrast this with a sector like consumer electronics, where users may replace products after only a few years. Other sectors focus on continuous innovation, while aerospace electronics may incorporate components that go out-of-production before a product has reached the end of its lifecycle, ultimately creating procurement and maintenance challenges.

Due to the reliability concerns present in aerospace systems, the industry is very conservative about applying product updates, selecting alternative parts, or updating systems currently deployed in the field simply because a part went obsolete. Much of this is driven by the end buyers of aerospace systems (governments and militaries), which have tend to take the ultra-conservative “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” view regarding product updates.

The result is that systems deployed in the field may rely on obsolete or end-of-life electronic components that perform critical functions, and there may not be any replacement parts that provide the required level of reliability.

The Challenges of Obsolescence in Aerospace

Aerospace companies have found that reducing the number of reworks helps them remain compliant with industry safety standards, and minimizes the risks associated with poor-quality or counterfeit products.

However, efforts to mitigate risk in one area can inadvertently create new challenges. For instance, as they strive to prolong the use of tried and tested parts, these will inevitably become scarce in the face of obsolescence. In any case, aerospace buyers must factor in various scenarios to ensure they remain ahead of the curve. 

• Maintaining Legacy Systems: In light of rapid changes and technological advances, teams maintain legacy systems instead of undergoing costly and uncertain reworks. With regulatory compliance to consider; the safety aspect of aviation, authorities must ensure that legacy hardware marries upcoming software. 
• Acquiring Legacy Parts: Procurement is a vital function for aviation as components become harder to acquire over time. Knowing that parts will inevitably become unattainable, the procurement-engineer relationship is vital for preempting end-of-life.
• Qualifying Replacement Parts: Parts that can be used in a new version of a product require more research and testing to prove reliability. Product designers cannot select replacement parts for a design update based only on electrical specifications.
• Counterfeit Risks and Quality Assurance: As components become obsolete, aerospace procurement managers can turn to distributors in order to purchase from remaining inventories. Here lies another challenge as they must establish whether parts are legitimate, and visibility of authorized versus unauthorized distributors goes a long way in this process. 

How Aerospace Organizations Can Manage Component Obsolescence

The first step in managing obsolescence is maintaining a clear view of global developments—not just in technology, but also in part lifecycle policies and regulations.

There are four key drivers of obsolescence in the aerospace PCB sector:

• The environmental impact of legacy, lead-based parts.
• The changes to safety and reliability standards and regulations.
• The cost of supplying and manufacturing old configurations.
• The cost of acquiring certain parts due to trade tariff changes.

Predict Environmental Implications

There is a major push to remove lead from components. Aerospace has relied on lead-based platings and solder for decades due to its reliability and durability in harsh environments; to date, lead-free solder has never been qualified for use in aerospace electronics. In fact, tin-based pin platings, PCB platings, and solder formulations are no-go for aerospace products for use in-flight, even if they contain some lead.

Component manufacturers often produce leaded and lead-free versions of the same part, but as RoHS and a lead-free mentality has proliferated, more component manufacturers are making their leaded parts obsolete while continuing to produce the lead-free variant. This forces companies to locate potential replacements early and hope they don’t go EOL before an upcoming production run. Unfortunately, this is not always successful as identified replacements can also go EOL, often forcing a redesign before production.

Supplier Relationship Management

While lead-based parts and other legacy materials are available to the aerospace industry, there remains an inherent need to consider the potential changes in the future. Buyers cannot, and should not, expect to overcome obsolescence alone, and the insight available to suppliers could influence how well they prepare for the future. 

Aerospace buyers rely on early insight from suppliers to understand the component lifecycle. Despite the fact that certain PCB materials will be abolished and that manufacturers will be the first to pull the plug on production, companies are able to sustain the use of certain components post-discontinuation. 

Leverage Distributor Inventories

Supplier insight is crucial to longevity while lead-based components remain permissible in aerospace systems. Ongoing or ease of supplier research is a critical element of proactive supply chain management and, for aerospace buyers, is a necessary risk management strategy. 

With the help of Octopart, aerospace procurement teams have the ability to plan for obsolescence. They know that environmental impact is a major factor driving PCB innovation, and will need to shift their gaze towards non-lead parts, but distributors can provide interim solutions. 

Engineers must look into the future, though, as short-term reactive solutions could incur cost and development implications down the line. For instance, if procurement managers spend all their time plugging the gaps, they may fail to consider if their systems are equipped for the real change—non-lead component integration.

Altium 365 for Aviation Obsolescence Management and Innovation

Organizations that lack supplier insight will struggle to proactively manage obsolescence. Aerospace innovation is built on forward-thinking strategies, and system reworks are inevitable as new materials and functionalities emerge.

Altium 365 streamlines part sourcing and bill of materials (BOM) management by integrating supplier data and lifecycle information, helping teams respond quickly to component changes.

With its supply chain management suite, aerospace teams can build resilient BOMs, manage change with greater agility, and plan effectively for both short-term disruptions and long-term shifts in materials and compliance.

Conclusion

Component obsolescence in aerospace demands a balance between maintaining legacy systems and preparing for future innovation. As environmental regulations and supply chain dynamics evolve, companies must adopt forward-thinking strategies. 

With proactive lifecycle management, strong supplier collaboration, and digital tools like Altium 365, aerospace organizations can ensure long-term system reliability while seamlessly transitioning to safer, more sustainable electronic components.

Ready to take control of the mil-aero electronics lifecycle and collaborate seamlessly across engineering teams? Discover how to build aerospace and defense systems in a secure cloud environment!