Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/844209
10 SMT Magazine • July 2017 By Stephen Las Marias I-CONNECT007 For this month's issue of our publications at I-Connect007, we invited a sampling of profes- sionals whose experience centers on the elec- tronics industry in the military and aerospace world, including experts from design, PCB manufacturing, and the assembly arena to sit down with us for a frank discussion. Joining us were Freedom CAD's COO Scott Miller; Len- thor Engineering VP of Sales/Engineering John Rolle and VP of Marketing Dave Moody; and Zentech's CEO and President Matt Turpin and VP John Vaughan. Our discussion centered on the challeng- es associated with military work, including the new regulatory requirements for cybersecurity, dealing with leaded vs. lead-free components, and the differences and similarities with the commercial world. The discussion started on the PCB design perspective, whether the challenges are more technical or more centered on the administra- tive side, such as on regulations. Mil/Aero Electronics Supply Chain Facing New Challenges "I can tell you from our perspective, this year and going forward, the rules of engage- ment have really begun to change because of cybersecurity, and that's having a huge impact on the engineering services community—how to comply with cybersecurity requirements that are now being mandated to us as exter- nal suppliers," explained Freedom CAD's Mill- er. "It's something we're spending a lot of time on. We've got work to do. We are ITAR-compli- ant, but cybersecurity compliance is a far deep- er level of compliance than ITAR information management. That's huge. We're engaging with a consultant to help us understand how we can fulfill those requirements. And I think that's go- ing to be a game changer for a lot of the smaller companies that currently participate in the mil/ aerospace marketplace, because there are some serious costs associated with cybersecurity man- agement. "It's a year-end objective. They want to have a supply base compliant, or at least have identi- fied where the holes are, the weaknesses are, as far as we can tell, but there's a huge impact. As- suming we overcome and address that, the oth- FEATU RE