NEWS - ARTICLE

Thousands of Australian SMEs will have the opportunity to work under one supply chain system to help streamline the process of working with the Australian Department of Defence and major primes in the nation’s defence sector.

The system emulates a successful UK program and has already been adopted locally by the Department of Defence and companies including BAE Systems Australia, Raytheon Australia, Babcock Australasia (Babcock), Lockheed Martin Australia, Boeing Defence Australia, and Saab Australia.

Known as JOSCAR, the system currently comprises two dozen major defence companies and 6,000 small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) and constitutes a supplier management community that has slashed compliance and administration costs for UK buyers and suppliers.

“Australian SMEs now have the opportunity to secure the same benefits through the introduction of a standardised and simplified approach that has the endorsement of a number of major primes,” said Tom Maund, Country Manager of Hellios Australia, the UK-based supplier information and risk management company that has developed the new system.

The system offers a ‘one to many’ solution where a supplier only needs to fill in the JOSCAR questionnaire once, even if it supplies multiple defence primes and the Department of Defence.

Industry has welcomed the new system and the prospect of lower costs passed on to members of the SME community.

Babcock’s Chief Executive Officer Andrew Cridland said:

“Babcock is committed to minimising the barriers to entry for SMEs wanting to break into the defence industry. By using JOSCAR, we are making it easier for our partners and suppliers to do business with us.”

“This is a great initiative and one that our company wholeheartedly endorses,” said Ben Hudson, Chief Executive Officer, BAE Systems Australia. “We’re looking forward to working with industry and the system’s architects to ensure supplier efficiencies can be implemented across our major programs.”

The Australian JOSCAR system will be managed and supported by a Hellios team based in Brisbane and led by Tom Maund. JOSCAR will launch in June 2024