Key Challenges in Managing Software Obsolescence for Industrial Product-Service Systems (IPS2)

The defence industry is moving rapidly towards new types of agreement such as availability contracts based on Industrial Product-Service System (IPS2) business models. Obsolescence has become one of the main problems that will impact on a system during its life cycle. Most of the research carried out has been focused on electronic components, neglecting the impact of obsolescence in other areas such as software. This paper presents the concept of software obsolescence and highlights the key challenges and mitigation strategies to managing it, which was identified through a set of semi-structured interviews with experts in defence, aerospace and nuclear industries and literature review in software and obsolescence management. It is observed that there is a lack of understanding of the software obsolescence and the impact that it has on the systems.