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last updated: 03/21/05	The TRENT solution is a combination of processes, tools, and an information technology (IT) infrastructure that enables companies to manage TM as a comprehensive activity, which enables transformational weapons system products to be produced, sustained, and enhanced in a much shorter period of time, and at lower cost. TRENT will produce an optimized TM solution for any weapon system. It will facilitate the decision making process of whether to perform technology insertion, technology refresh, or “do nothing” during the weapon system’s planned availabilities. TRENT is expected to speed improvements of Navy weapon systems by reducing the cycle time for introducing new technologies and enhanced capabilities by at least 25%. TRENT will improve the readiness, mission capability, and life-cycle affordability of Navy weapon systems by developing a transformational enterprise wide capability for integrating technology management tools. The TRENT Program will be successful when it has led to deployment of changes in supply chain processes/technologies within one or more Navy weapon system procurement programs resulting in improved affordability. The Problem Technology management (TM) decisions are primarily reactive and based on short term gains Solutions stand alone, incomplete, and are not easily integrated Companies lack methods of sharing TM information across their supply chains Suppliers find it difficult to communicate their future technology plans to their customers The TRENT Solution TRENT provides an integration framework that incorporates a standard process and technology management data model to integrate existing and emerging tools for obsolescence, technology refresh optimization, roadmapping, reliability analysis and other TM tools. TRENT will develop and pilot the framework with LM-JSF and Raytheon SM3 to verify the business case and ROI, then advance to deployment. Mandate for Transformation The Nation’s leadership is asking for rapid, transformational innovation in the military… “The need for military transformation was clear before [September 11]. What’s different today is our sense of urgency: The need to build this future force while fighting a present war." -President George W. Bush “I’m looking for help (tool, process, combination of all) that enables identification of proactive engineering solutions [to DMSMS], where there is a business case to preemptively solve a problem.” -Mr. John Becker - ADUSD(SCI) Opportunities for Savings A recent cost study of a major weapons platform showed that supplier-managed technology management would result in 20% savings for total TM cost. However, this scenario carries unacceptable risk with current technology, because there is no visibility of TM details by the prime at the supplier level. The TRENT solution enables a hybrid approach to technology management (joint Supplier/Prime-managed technology refresh) which mitigates risk by providing visibility and collaboration to the entire supply chain, including the DoD and DoN customer. The conservative goal of TRENT is a total savings of 10% for TM. TRENT leverages the financial advantage of supplier-managed technology management while mitigating the risk For more information contact Phil Rosche: (843) 760-3593 rosche@aticorp.org
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