The Most Important Results of the New AIAG Standards

The Automotive Industry Action Group (AIAG) and German Association of the Automotive Industry (VDA) are the uppermost units when it moves toward to regulations and good practices in the auto industry. Yet they do not always speak the same language, and FMEA (Failure Mode and Effect Analysis) is one area where there are diverse considerations. 2019 was the year of change, the year of harmonization.

After many years of discussions regarding differences in application and the methodology related to FMEA, the 5th edition was jointly launched, harmonizing practices between the AIAG and VDA. Three years of combined efforts resulted in important changes that have a straight impact on companies across the entire auto industry.

It is worth noting that this change had already been anticipated for some time by companies providing services in numerous markets and they need their processes to be validated using more than one standard.

The revised FMEA process is now embodied by six stages:

Stage 1: Definition of scope and project planning.

Stage 2: Structure analysis

Stage 3: Function analysis

Stage 4: Resource analysis

Stage 5: Risk analysis

Stage 6: Optimization

RPN is not as important anymore

This change was somewhat surprising since this element was always considered the foundation of the FMEA, but RPN (Risk Priority Number) no longer brings as much weight. The chief component now is AP (Action Priority). AP is not risk priority, it is action priority (high, medium or low) to reduce the risk of failure in the intended function.

Updated score tables

The standards for Severity, Occurrence, and Detection were revised in an effort to guarantee harmonization among the models.