Americom Government Services (AGS,Inc.)
Under two consecutive annual consultant agreements HKA has provided technical manual development, proposal management, process documentation, and configuration management support to this leading satellite communication equipment integrator. The subject matter is highly complex cutting edge equipment. The systems delivered are in a continuous state of development to keep pace with technological advances, therefore, configuration management is a constant concern, accuracy and readability are essential and technical documentation delivery turn-around times are non-negotiable.
This company was in the midst of rapid growth, transitioning from a small niche developer and integrator to a recognized leader in its field. As a result, this company wisely concentrated on growing its personnel resources in the areas of management, engineering, and production, but was unable to keep pace with the growing documentation requirements that were associated with that growth.
Our initial tasking was to create an operator’s manual and a quick-start guide for one of their products. As the client gained confidence in our support and their product line diversified, they continued to expand our tasking to include:
- Providing operation and maintenance documentation for their other products;
- Development of documentation for training, field maintenance and depot maintenance;
- Complete life-cycle documentation for all of their product lines.
One particularly problematic area for this client was control of the development
of engineering data, drawings, inventory and their coordination between engineering
design and production as well as change/revision/release control procedures. 
Our solution was to work with their engineering, drafting and production management and staff to develop a proven and reliable numbering schema for control of their parts inventory and drawing sets. This included the development of update and revision controls and release procedures. We were also tasked with the research and implementation of an automated inventory system to control all aspects of parts and product inventory, requisitioning and purchasing.
Some of the resulting benefits to this client were:
- Consistent and accurate
drawing and part number policies and procedures with strong version controls.
- Decrease in obsolescent inventory and improved accuracy of inventory
data.
- Improved time to market of their products from design to delivery (a
large percentage of their product development was via integration and predominantly
custom configurations for each of their customers).
- Improved accuracy of design information for external fabricators.
- Strong production and testing procedures
- Complete documentation of their processes and procedures which aid
in daily operation and the training and indoctrination of new employees.
- Freedom of their managers, engineers and production staff to concentrate on managing, designing, and producing their product.