Key lifecycle decisions

Avionics and airborne electronics lifecycle

• Certification route

  Tool flow and design data

  Will the equipment be approved as part of an aircraft or engine type design, under a technical standard order or its European equivalent, or supplied to an integrator who holds the approval?

  Taken in: Aircraft and System Requirements stage

  Options, owner and consequences

  Options

  • Part of the integrator's type design, with the integrator as applicant
  • Technical standard order authorisation held by the equipment maker
  • Both, with an authorisation and installation approval by the integrator

  Weighed on

  Customer and marketWho holds the approval and its obligationsReuse across aircraftCertification authority involvement

  Owner: Certification program manager. Consulted: Customer program manager, Systems engineer, Quality systems manager

  Consequences: Sets who submits the plans, who the authority deals with, and the obligations for production and continued airworthiness.

  Frozen by: Plans submitted gate

  Related decisions: Development assurance level allocation

• Development assurance level allocation

  Other decisions

  Which development assurance level does each hardware and software item carry, and can architecture with independent items lower the level of some of them?

  Taken in: Assurance levels assigned gate

  Options, owner and consequences

  Options

  • Each item at the level of the most severe failure condition it can contribute to
  • A lower level for some items where independent, dissimilar items share the function
  • Partitioning that separates items of different levels

  Weighed on

  Failure condition classificationIndependence that can be shownCost and schedule of each levelIntegrator agreement

  Owner: Safety analysis engineer. Consulted: Systems engineer, Certification program manager, System hardware architect, Embedded software architect

  Consequences: Fixes the objectives, independence and verification rigour of every later stage; raising a level later reopens plans and evidence.

  Frozen by: Assurance levels assigned gate

  Related decisions: Software partitioning architecture, Device technology for each hardware function

• Export classification of the equipment and its data

  Other decisions

  Under which export rules, the ITAR or the EAR with its ECCN, do the equipment, its software and its technical data fall, and what access controls follow?

  Taken in: Assurance levels assigned gate

  Options, owner and consequences

  Options

  • Controlled under the EAR with its ECCN
  • Controlled under the ITAR as a defence article
  • Design choices that change the classification

  Weighed on

  Civil or military end useCustomer base and destinationsWho may work on the designLicence lead times

  Owner: Export control and trade compliance manager. Consulted: Contracts counsel, Certification program manager, System hardware architect

  Consequences: Decides who can see the design, where it can be built and tested and which customers can be served; a late change can stop shipments.

  Frozen by: Assurance levels assigned gate

858 more decisions for registered members.