STAGE 4: QUALIFICATION PLAN EXECUTION

Stage 4 represents the execution of technology qualification activities listed in the TQP and the documentation of evidence. The documented evidence may be in the form of data and insights through experience, numerical analyses and tests. It is possible that during the execution of an activity, deviations from the plan are necessary, such as in the event of premature failure of a component. In this case the TQ plan would be updated in accordance with the Management of Change (MoC) system, see Stage 5: Review. Evidence traceability is key to supporting the conclusions of each qualification activity. For example in the case of performance tests investigating a particular failure mode, failure occurrences and their statistical margins in the context of expected performance would be recorded. This allows independent reviews of the qualification process to take place at a later date, perhaps in the form of due diligence of the technology.

Generally, the format of the performance reports would include the following aspects: component identifier, test (or analysis) conducted, supporting documentation as well as key findings. The TQ plan would be updated at regular intervals to include the status of the qualification activities.

In order to facilitate the oversight of qualification progress, the TQR spreadsheet includes a means of tracking the progress of each TQ activity in terms of setting a target completion date and percentage progress. The sheet provides a visual indicator of activity status and level of achievement within with respect to the target completion date.