This paper describes how incorporating a model-driven development process into the development life cycle lays the groundwork for an integrated design flow. This process helps address systems integration issues faced by aerospace contractors and subcontractors today.

Model-driven development provides a structure for managing complexity while, at each design stage, making it possible to directly link design functionality back to a development program's original requirements and functional specifications. A virtual prototyping infrastructure, in which models from different domains can be integrated at each stage of the development life cycle, allows system integration issues to be identified and addressed earlier in the program. This not only helps reduce overall program time and cost, but makes these easier to predict, reducing program risk.