F-35's ALIS ‘Way Behind,’ Bogdan Says; One Step Forward Last Week

http://breakingdefense.com/2014/02/f-35s-alis-way-behind-bogdan-says-one-step-forward-last-week/

F-35?s ALIS ‘Way Behind,’ Bogdan Says; One Step Forward Last Week
By Colin Clark
on February 25, 2014 at 3:32 PM

NEWSEUM: The key maintenance software program for the F-35, called ALIS, is “way behind,” Lt. Gen. Christopher Bogdan, head of the program, said today. How far behind? “We are way behind. We are way behind.”

Bogdan told a conference hosted by Credit Suisse and organized by Jim McAleese here that he “could spend hours talking about what’s right and what’s wrong with ALIS,” the Autonomic Logistics Information System. But he kept it pretty short. Program leaders realized the system, designed to monitor the aircraft’s systems and maintenance needs, was a hell of a lot more important and complex than they had originally foreseen. ”It is way more important and way more complicated than that,” Bogdan said, adding that it needs to be treated “like its own weapon system.”

While the program is ”in catch-up mode with ALIS,” Bogdan said they were beginning to see improvements in the system. The latest software update was done at Eglin Air Force Base this weekend. “Normally with ALIS we would take one step forward and two steps back. This time we actually took a step forward and didn’t take a step back. That is encouraging, that because of the way we are changing the development of ALIS we starting to see results. But we are way behind. We are way behind.”

Lockheed Martin defended the program, while acknowledging the problems. “We recognize ALIS has had challenges and we are working with our Joint Program Office and field users to address them,” spokesman Mike Rein said in an email. “An ALIS software update is currently undergoing installation across F-35 bases for increased processing speed. We are incorporating user feedback to further advance the system and intend to field the next major release of ALIS in first quarter of 2015 to provide additional capability. ALIS is maturing in parallel with the aircraft and our team is committed to delivering the most advanced and capable fleet management system with ALIS.”