Judging by the industry’s reaction to the ongoing AOG Technics paperwork scam, the threat of criminals being criminals is not enough to drive major changes in how airline parts are procured, tracked, and validated.
At Aviation Week’s recent MRO Americas event, representatives of both airlines and MRO shops cited long-established practices as effective buffers: long-term relationships with their existing vendors and a careful vetting process for new ones. The safeguards in place are sufficient and eliminating opportunists—even ones that forge paperwork that claim used parts are factory-new—is impossible.
Perhaps.
But AOG’s scheme underscores a larger, all-too-familiar challenge for aircraft operators, lessors, and maintainers: the benefits of parts traceability that ideally comes with a full maintenance history.
“Back-to-birth traceability of aircraft parts is an issue that numerous industry organizations have been facing for a long time,” wrote Chris Markou, head of technical operations at IATA, in a 2022 piece for Aviation Week’s Inside MRO. “That is because the transfer of aircraft parts between industry stakeholders is inherently linked to regulations and commercial contract provisions around the maintenance history of those parts. However, the lack of a common industry approach to traceability creates unnecessary bureaucracy and interminable negotiations between the trading partners, all conducive to frustration, time wastage and significant loss of asset value.”
Absent some real-world ramifications like bent metal or, worse, an accident with casualties, one unapproved parts case—even as one as large as the AOG saga—is unlikely to trigger major changes in how parts are bought and sold. But it may help tilt some cost-benefits analyses in favor of adopting, or at least testing, new processes with broader ramifications.
GE Aerospace and Safran, co-owners of CFM International—its CFM56 engines were the most targeted by AOG—are onboard. Though any change—and none is guaranteed—would likely come slowly, the manufacturers are committed to at least exploring areas for internal improvement and external collaboration.
They are not alone.
Air France Industries KLM Engineering & Maintenance (AFIKLM) is among the others exploring digital tracking too. The effort was well underway before AOG Technics ever made the news.
Ben Moreau, the MRO provider’s SVP of strategy and business development, suggests the development helps build a case for better ways to keep track of parts and their data.
How to proceed is “definitely an industry question,” Moreau said. “Traceability is not a matter of one player, but all players [throughout] the value chain, from the new [parts] through the full life and the dismantling of the aircraft.”
The investment would pay off, he added, even without the threat of criminal activity. “Even in a world of people acting well, this would generate significant savings,” Moreau said.
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