Safety has always been a key requirement for aviation systems, and as the world digitally transforms it is both more important and more complex than ever. For military airborne platforms, the U.S. Department of Defense is promoting the implementation of open architecture solutions to enable more capable avionics hardware and software and to transition systems into the field faster and at lower cost.
To meet this requirement, the Future Airborne Capability Environment (FACE™) consortium developed an open architecture technical standard as well as business models for implementing FACE standards, which includes profiles for safety systems. But safety engineering practices are outside the domain of the FACE Technical Standard—these are left to industry best practices and existing safety processes such as RTCA DO-178C.
Aviation experts from Wind River®, Rapita Systems, and Collins Aerospace discuss these topics and more.