Procurement and importing in new product projects of Brazilian aerospace program

New product development is a business process with many functional interactions in a company. The concurrency of these interactions must be managed in order to meet the preestablished schedule, budget and scope. The issue of procurement is central to a succesful project. When a new project belongs to an aerospace program this issue is even more crucial. And when the aerospace program belongs to a developing country such as Brazil, the core issue involves its budget and schedule planning. This article addresses the question of procurement in a small company designing a new satellite camera for the Brazilian Government. The procurement process was mapped, a monitoring structure was created and performance indicators were developed. The performance indicators are discussed to understand the leverage of each kind of purchased item and each process step on costs and schedule.