Supply Chain 21 (SC21) is a change programme which aims to accelerate the competitiveness of the UK's defence and aerospace industry by raising the performance of its supply chains.
- SC21 provides an efficient and cost effective way of improving the performance of suppliers.
- SC21 compliments the objectives of the UK Government's Defence Industrial Strategy which recognises that the supplier networks need to be modernised.
- DE&S DSR have recognised the role of SC21 as the leading improvement programme.
- Signatory companies commit to working collaboratively with peer customers to suppliers on three work streams to accelerate supply chain performance, remove duplication and lower overheads and costs:
Accreditation
- Improve quality performance across the Aerospace and Defence Supply Chains and thus reduce the number of duplicated quality interventions; in particular by adopting common standards such as AS/EN 91XX and Nadcap and fostering continuous sustainable best practices across the industry.
Development and Performance
- To use a common process for supplier development and improvement, and manage through a common agreed improvement plan.
Relationships
- To use the relationship management review process and the Relationship Measurement tool (RMM) to measure and agree improvement objectives within relationships
Implementation
- Implementation is led through the implementation working group, comprising BAE Systems 16 Key Customers (Primes and Tier 1 companies), SBAC and all 9 regional partners.
- Over 150 suppliers are participating in implementing SC21.
- Performance is tracked monthly through the national implementation plan, which is published monthly on the SC21 website.
- Suppliers can self implement SC21 using the self starter guide (see SC21 website)
Background
BAE Systems' support for SC21 builds on the existing strategic management programmes developed by the Company and its supply chain over the last few years. Within BAE Systems we take a tiered approach to supplier management, ranging from full strategic and operational performance partnerships with our most strategic major suppliers to performance management with our general supply base. We recognise improvement in performance is dependent upon open communication and clear improvement plans which must be two way to be effective.
