Aerospace and defense: Lean software for aerospace and defense manufacturing
LeanSuite gives aerospace and defense manufacturers one system for the daily routines AS9100 work depends on. FOD walks and tool checks carry photo evidence, nonconformances are routed to a fix, and work instructions are drafted from video. Certified mechanics are tracked by skill, and first article checks are recorded step by step.
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The problem
What slows aerospace and defense plants down
Aerospace and defense plants build low volumes of complex, high-value products, with special processes, long travelers and customer source inspection. Most work to AS9100, with first article inspection to AS9102 and special processes accredited through Nadcap. Here is where that slows them down.
Foreign object debris
A dropped rivet, a lost tool or a bit of safety wire left in an assembly can damage an engine or fail a final inspection. FOD prevention depends on clean-as-you-go habits, area walks and tool accountability on every shift, which paper logs struggle to prove.
First article inspection
A new part number, a design change or a new source, process or tooling calls for a first article inspection, often to AS9102: every characteristic ballooned and measured, and material and special process certifications checked. It is slow, it holds the lot, and one missed characteristic sends the part back.
Nonconformances and MRB backlog
Every nonconforming part needs containment, a disposition from the material review board and often a corrective action. When NCRs live in email and spreadsheets, parts wait in the MRB area for days, and the same nonconformance comes back on the next lot.
Missed steps on long travelers
A build traveler can run to hundreds of operations, inspection points and stamps. Steps get missed or signed out of order, work instructions go stale after an engineering change, and writing a new one takes an engineer hours.
Tool control and shadow boards
Every tool taken to the assembly has to come back, and a missing one can stop work until it is found. Shadow boards, tool checks at shift start and end and calibration dates all depend on people doing the check every time.
Long learning curves on low-rate builds
Each unit takes hundreds of labor hours, and with only a few units a month, people rarely repeat a job often enough to settle the best way to do it. Hours per unit come down more slowly than the bid assumed, and nobody can see which steps lose the time.
Work held by a few certified people
Special processes, NDT, wiring, sealing and torque-critical tasks are limited to people with current certifications or stamps. When a certified mechanic or inspector is out, the job waits for the one person who can sign it off.
Bought-in parts and special processes
Detail parts, castings, forgings and special processes often come from suppliers, and a defect found at assembly costs far more than one caught at receiving. Getting a supplier to respond with a corrective action can take weeks of email.
How LeanSuite helps
How LeanSuite helps aerospace and defense plants
Each problem maps to a LeanSuite module you can start with on its own, then connect to the rest.
Foreign object debris
In LeanSuite: Build the FOD walk in Lean Creator, or let the AI draft it, and schedule it in Daily Standard Work to a person, a role or a machine, with a repeat rule. Auditors complete it on a phone or tablet with photo evidence where required, and every non-conformance becomes a tracked action with an owner.
First article inspection
In LeanSuite: Build the first article check in Lean Creator as a checklist with number limits, required photos and signatures. An out-of-spec answer can raise a tag or start a CAPA automatically, and you walk into any customer or internal audit with a time-stamped record of every check.
Nonconformances and MRB backlog
In LeanSuite: Each non-conformance is captured with photos and routed to quality and engineering. Containment tasks, such as quarantining a batch, are assigned and time-stamped before root cause analysis starts. Systemic issues run through 8D or DMAIC in Kaizen & Projects, and the fix goes to every affected operator as a One-Point Lesson before the NCR closes.
Missed steps on long travelers
In LeanSuite: Film the job once and LeanSuite drafts the work instruction with numbered steps, photos, tools, PPE and warnings from the video. Engineers can edit every step before it is published, and drafts can be routed to engineering, EHS and quality for sign-off.
Tool control and shadow boards
In LeanSuite: Schedule tool checks at the start and end of every shift as checklists with pictures and videos for each step. Critical checks can require a QR scan or photo as proof, a missed check triggers an alert, and operators raise an issue tag without leaving the checklist.
Long learning curves on low-rate builds
In LeanSuite: Film the process on a phone and LeanSuite times every element, splits value-added from waste and links each figure to its video frame. Certify a checked study and it becomes the reference for later studies of the same process. Vision AI is priced separately from the facility plan.
Work held by a few certified people
In LeanSuite: Competency Management keeps a live skills matrix whose levels update as people complete training and on-the-job sign-offs. Refresher courses reassign themselves, for example yearly, and late training shows as overdue. The Job Cover Matrix filters qualified, available people by shift, department or proficiency.
Bought-in parts and special processes
In LeanSuite: Lean Creator runs inbound inspections with photos and pass/fail logic at the dock. Issue Management routes each defect to the supplier as a SCAR, the days the supplier takes to respond with an 8D or containment plan are tracked, and KPI dashboards build supplier scores and defect trends from the data.
Customers
Companies that use LeanSuite
Whirlpool case study
How Whirlpool tackled project visibility and continuous improvement across 14 manufacturing plants with LeanSuite.
Its Global Kaizen Power Pitch saw 150 Kaizen presented, $14.8M in hard savings and $17.6M in soft savings.
14
Manufacturing plants
150
Kaizen presented at the Global Kaizen Power Pitch
$14.8M
Hard savings
$17.6M
Soft savings
What getting started looks like
Under a week
Until your first module is live; our team does the setup
$3,000
90-day pilot per facility
One flat price per facility
Unlimited users, so adding people does not change the price
99.5%
Monthly uptime commitment in the service agreement
SOC 2 Type 1 audited, hosted on secure cloud infrastructure, with single sign-on through Microsoft Entra ID or Okta and employee-ID sign-in for operators without email. Details on the security page.
Want to try it on one line first? See how the 90-day pilot works.
Free tools
Related free calculators
Work out the numbers behind these problems. Each calculator shows its formula and a worked example, with no sign-up.
First pass yield (FPY) calculator
First pass yield at each step and rolled throughput yield (RTY) across the whole process.
Open calculatorDPMO and sigma level calculator
DPMO, defects per unit, yield and sigma level from the defects found, units checked and opportunities per unit.
Open calculatorProcess capability (Cp, Cpk) calculator
Cp and Cpk against your specification limits, plus Pp and Ppk from pasted measurements, with a distribution chart.
Open calculatorTime study sample size calculator
How many cycles of an element to time, from your first readings, with the t formula, the ILO formula and the range method.
Open calculator
FAQ
Questions from aerospace and defense plants
Yes, as checklists you build in Lean Creator and schedule to a person, a role or a machine with a repeat rule. People complete them on a phone or tablet with photo evidence where required, missed checks show in red, and every finding becomes a tracked action with an owner. Your FOD prevention program, such as one built to AS9146, decides what to check; LeanSuite runs and records the checks.
You can build first article checks as checklists in Lean Creator, with number limits, required photos and signatures, and an out-of-spec answer can raise a tag or start a CAPA automatically. LeanSuite is not presented as producing the AS9102 forms or as making a first article compliant. If your customer requires the AS9102 forms or a specific FAI tool, keep using them, and use LeanSuite for the checks and actions around them.
LeanSuite is not a certification and does not make a plant compliant. It helps teams run and evidence the routines AS9100 and customer requirements call for, such as audits, training records, nonconformances and corrective actions, with a time-stamped record of every check and action that can be exported for the auditor.
Ask us about hosting before any controlled data goes in. LeanSuite has a SOC 2 Type 1 report, is hosted on secure cloud infrastructure and supports SAML 2.0 or OAuth single sign-on with Microsoft Entra ID and Okta, but this page makes no claim about ITAR, CMMC, FedRAMP or export-controlled data. Buyers with those requirements should ask about hosting first. You can also start with routines that hold no controlled technical data, such as FOD walks, training records and near-miss reporting.
No. An ERP runs orders, inventory and finance, and an MES runs and records production, often with electronic travelers. LeanSuite runs the improvement system around them: finding problems, fixing them and keeping the fix in place through standards, audits and training.
LeanSuite is one flat price per facility with unlimited users, so every operator on every shift can use it without adding seats. There is no published annual price; you can request a quote on the pricing page. The first module is live in under a week, and LeanSuite's team does the setup. A 90-day pilot costs $3,000 per facility.
See LeanSuite on your FOD walks and nonconformances
Bring the routine you want to fix first. We will show you how LeanSuite handles it and what a 90-day pilot would cover.