TDC History

Traditionally, suppliers in the test and diagnostics area have focused on specific industries when promoting their products. Cross-pollination of technology rarely occurs outside of these traditional industry boundaries. Additionally, end-users of test and diagnostics have not organized their efforts in presenting suppliers with specific initiatives.

For the past few years, the Department of Defense (DoD) has been addressing the issues of test and diagnostics and their associated costs. Most of this work has been performed within a working group in the DoD Automatic Test Systems Executive Agent Office. This working group has formed several joint industry/service task groups to address specific cost drivers in a comprehensive environment for test. Through participation in these joint groups, the DoD realized that industry is in a better position to provide solutions to the technical issues at hand.

From this viewpoint, the DoD interviewed leading companies from a diverse industrial base on the test and diagnostic issues that they were addressing. As a result of these interviews it was determined that these industries were all experiencing similar challenges, therefore they were approached about the concept of forming a consortium to focus on test and diagnostics issues. The response from these industries to the idea of a consortium was positive. Therefore, it was decided that the consortium would be formed and that it would have leadership from end user industries and work towards solutions that promote test and diagnostics issues for both end-users and suppliers.

The specific needs of the Consortium could best be served if a set of defined requirements were presented to industry for possible solutions. In recent years, this has been the approach and has yielded the best results for everyone.

Each end-user of the consortium has unique requirements not shared with its industry counterparts, and for these situations, specific solutions will need to be developed. But, the technology areas being addressed by the test and diagnostics consortium can generally be applied across multiple industries. Further, a goal of the consortium is to increase the commonality of test and diagnostics environments and applications across the various industries represented to allow for greater cooperation and transfer of technology and approaches. This also facilitates the development of solutions since suppliers have an opportunity to reach an expanded user base for presenting ideas and providing solutions.

These thoughts have culminated in the formation of the Test and Diagnostics Consortium. This industry-led group addresses common initiatives related to test and diagnostics. Within this group, the members assume active roles as participants alongside each other representing their organizations, with an emphasis on increasing the commonality among the industries and finding solutions that benefit multiple industries.