The aerospace & defense industry is poised to enter another period of change as defense budget priorities shift away from large transformational programs and towards support of global operations. A key driver of this is the rising threat of asymmetric and 4th generation warfare and the need for the U.S. and its NATO allies to play a global policing function. With finite resources, both human and financial, the Defense Department will increasingly seek innovation and collaboration with industry to develop rapidly deployable solutions that meet the soldiers' needs now.
Despite the changing market dynamics, aerospace & defense companies face continued pressure from investors to generate the strong level of financial returns as was indicative of the early 2000s. As major current programs experience cancellations and funding cuts, contractors are being forced to aggressively compete in shrinking core markets and find new sources of growth.
Leadership Required
Aerospace & defense companies have significant broad-based engineering and system integration capabilities that have many potential new and adjacent applications. The challenge for growth in defense companies is typically not due to lack of technical capability, but more so in having the market foresight and operational agility to meet market needs.
Leaders of aerospace & defense firms should better position their organizations for future growth by proactively defining specific business objectives, revisiting risk tolerances, and empowering employees to continually innovate. These companies must objectively re-examine the status-quo and swiftly drive changes in strategy, business models, and operational processes in order to help shape and benefit from evolving market dynamics.
Kaiser Experience
Aerospace & defense is one of Kaiser's largest industry practices. Our work in this industry serves a broad spectrum of domains, platforms, and systems. Service offerings include Strategy Development, Market Opportunity Analysis, Transaction Services, and Operational Effectiveness. Our primary clientele are leading defense prime / sub contractors, IT systems integrators, and major merchant suppliers of components.
Recent Engagement Examples
- Global Information Grid Opportunity Assessment: Scenario analysis of evolution of the GIG and determined client's likely market / competitive positioning; determined highest priority market segments and opportunity development strategies
- Establishing Adjacent Market Development Function: Development of robust market evaluation processes , decision frameworks, and supporting organization / resources; diagnostic of existing processes and comparison to best-in-class organizations to drive identification of improvement opportunities
- Improving Customer Intimacy: Determined the needed adjustments to client's customer engagement practices based on analysis of customer requirements, best-in-class and competitors' practices; developed key enterprise solutions (organization / processes / tools / metrics) to drive improved customer intimacy
