Forward-looking manufacturing companies have recognized the value of digital threads that bring together design and product information across the product life cycle, connecting the dots as information flows from design to manufacturing and on to services. Creating a reliable, scalable infrastructure to support digital thread programs can be a significant challenge, given the wide variety of legacy systems involved. At Mercury Systems we are using Kafka and Confluent to drive our digital thread program and put in place a product lifecycle management process for Industry 4.0. With the substantial year-on-year growth we were seeing, we needed a cloud-ready solution that goes beyond a basic, API-based integration layer based on Mulesoft or similar technology. If you’re wondering why Kafka makes sense for a digital thread, join us to learn how a real-time event streaming platform enables core strategies around ML/AI, microservices, model-based system engineering, and continuous improvement.

1. © Mercury Systems, Inc.
HARNESSING CLOUD NATIVE
FOR DIGITAL THREAD
Anu Mishra
Director, Application Engineering

2. © Mercury Systems, Inc. Approved for public release. //Public//
Mercury Systems at-a-glance
Innovation That Matters. By and For People Who Matter.
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Transformational business
model at the intersection
of high tech and defense
Deployed on 300+ programs –
serving defense Primes and
critical infrastructure providers
Making commercial technology
profoundly more accessible
Our goal is to provide all
processing solutions on
every system requiring
uncompromised computing
Defense industry’s
highest Glassdoor
employee ratings*
*Source: Capital Alpha Partners, “Glassdoor Data & Defense: Not Much Change Over the Past Year”, August 21, 2018
Founded in
1981
NASDAQ: MRCY

3. © Mercury Systems, Inc. Approved for public release. //Public//
Digital Thread For Engineering
BOMs/
Configuration
s
Requirements
Specifications
Project Plans
Regulatory
Test
Plans/Results Quality
Systems &
Metrics
Marketing
Materials Supplier
Data
Field Data
Service
Docs
CNC Code
Tooling
A Connected Mercury of Product
design, Manufacturing, Maintenance,
Quality and IoT
CAD
Models
CAE
Results
Product Design
Manufacturing
Quality
Shipment
Maintenance
Work
Instructions
Logistics
Repair
Data
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4. © Mercury Systems, Inc. Approved for public release. //Public//
Build and continuously enhance a world-class, agile, scalable organization utilizing state of the art processes
and tools to deliver innovative solutions at the speed of relevancy
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Start Structure Scale
Pilot & Initial Rollout Full Deployment Continuous Enhancement
§ DevSecOps practices defined and
implemented for software and
firmware
§ Pilot microservices based cloud
architecture on AWS GovCloud
§ Model Based Systems Engineering
piloted across multiple business
units
§ Build integrated presentation layer
for engineering data served from a
common data lake
§ Agile and scalable DevSecOps process
applied across all engineering
§ Scalable and highly available high-
performance compute environments
used on cloud to enhance engineering
throughput and support containerized
development
§ MBSE designs implemented to
facilitate simulation and automated
test environments
§ Data lake with all engineering data
readily available on a presentation
layer
§ Leading edge process and tools,
continually updated, make Mercury a
destination employer and industry
leader in Embedded DevSecOps
§ Predictive analytics, machine learning,
and artificial intelligence techniques
applied to optimize processes and
tools
§ MBSE implemented that enables
design simulation and testing to occur
prior to actual hardware build or
software implementation
§ Data lake expanded to include
product lifecycle data across design,
manufacturing, testing, and
maintenance
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5. © Mercury Systems, Inc. Approved for public release. //Public//
Digital Thread – Implementation Framework
§ DevSecOps
• Unification of Development, Security, and Operations
• Automated functional and non-functional testing
• Automate, monitor, and apply security at all phases of the software lifecycle
• Continuous Integration / Continuous Deployment (CI/CD) implemented for software and
firmware development
§ Agile Principles
• Agile principles implemented for deploying features faster
• Rapid prototyping
§ Stitching Digital Thread
• Mendix based portal with combined data from PLM/ERP/MES
• Confluent Kafka based event streaming across applications
• Apply Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning techniques
• All data in one location viewed with common tools
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6. © Mercury Systems, Inc. Approved for public release. //Public//
Enabling thread with common tools and processes
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7. © Mercury Systems, Inc. Approved for public release. //Public//
Part Creation – An example
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8. © Mercury Systems, Inc. Approved for public release. //Public//
Lessons Learned
§ Plan cluster upfront
§ Delayed data or data disappearance
§ APIs vs Rest Connector
§ Monitoring production and staying current
§ Enforce standardization around topics and governance
§ Building Kafka team internally

9. © Mercury Systems, Inc. Approved for public release. //Public//
Summary
§ Faster time to market
§ Faster overall development; more secure development
§ Ability to scale
§ Improved innovation pipeline and reduced cost of failure
§ Destination employer
Adds value to Mercury and to our customers
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10. mrcy.com
THANK YOU.
INNOVATION THAT MATTERS
mrcy.com