For decades, a sharp dividing line existed in the product development world: software was considered fluid and adaptable, while hardware was deemed rigid, slow, and bound to linear, sequential processes (Waterfall). In physical engineering—where changes require cutting metal, retooling factories, and meeting strict safety-critical regulatory requirements—the idea of "sprinting" or "iterating rapidly" was often dismissed as impractical or dangerous.

However, two benchmarks in the aerospace and defence sectors have shattered this boundary. Saab Aeronautics, with its JAS 39E Gripen fighter jet, and SpaceX, with its Falcon 9 and Starship programmes, have demonstrated that Agile and Lean principles are not only applicable to physical engineering but are crucial for maintaining a competitive edge in complex, high-risk environments.

"Saab and SpaceX have demonstrated that Agile and Lean principles are not only applicable to physical engineering but are crucial for maintaining a competitive edge in complex, high-risk environments."

Saab Aeronautics: The Gripen E Program

Developing a modern, multi-role fighter aircraft is one of the most complex, safety-critical systems engineering challenges in the world. Software, hardware, aerodynamics, and fuselage structure must integrate flawlessly, governed by rigorous military aviation certification standards.

Saab achieved this by organizing over 1,000 engineers into more than 100 autonomous, cross-functional teams. Rather than working in silos, teams were structured to own specific features or subsystems end-to-end, blending software, electronics, and mechanical specialists.

To manage the immense dependencies of an aircraft, Saab established a highly disciplined, synchronized cadence:

  • Synchronized Sprints: All 100+ teams run on a shared, three-week sprint rhythm. Every team starts and ends their sprint on the exact same day. This aligns dependency management and ensures that physical integration points occur regularly.
  • Rapid Daily Escalation: Saab designed a daily communication hierarchy that clears impediments in under 90 minutes. Teams hold daily standups at 7:30 a.m. blocker flags. By 7:45 a.m., representatives meet at the "teams-of-teams" level. By 8:45 a.m., unresolved blockers reach the executive action team, ensuring corporate-level support is unlocked within the same working day.
  • Continuous Co-location: Safety experts, test pilots, and simulator engineers are co-located with design teams. Feedback loops that typically take months in traditional aerospace programs occur in real-time, allowing engineers to test theories immediately in simulators.

SpaceX: Iterative Rocketry & Distributed Ownership

While Saab demonstrates how structured Agile can scale across large teams, SpaceX represents a different model of hardware agility: a "hardware-rich," rapid-prototyping paradigm that actively embraces physical failure as a source of telemetry and learning.

SpaceX’s model rests on three distinct pillars:

  • The "Responsible Engineer" (RE) Model: Traditional aerospace relies heavily on centralized systems engineering departments that define and freeze requirements before design starts. SpaceX dismantled this structure. Every component is owned by a single Responsible Engineer (RE) who is accountable for the design, requirements, manufacturing, and testing of that part. By removing handoffs between departments, SpaceX eliminates communication bottlenecks and empowers engineers to make immediate modifications.
  • Designing for Change (Additive Manufacturing): Traditional tooling (casting, forging, custom molds) locks in designs. If a component must change, the factory tooling must be scrapped and rebuilt, costing millions and adding months. SpaceX bypassed this by heavily investing in 3D printing and modular sheet-metal assemblies. This allows them to iterate on rocket engine components (like the Merlin and Raptor engines) continuously, implementing hundreds of design updates directly into the production line.
  • Testing to Failure: Rather than spending years in mathematical modeling and simulation to prove a design will work, SpaceX builds physical prototypes quickly and tests them to destruction. This "fail fast" method exposes real-world failure modes that simulations miss, accelerating the learning curve.

The Core Principles of Hardware Agility

When we look across both Saab and SpaceX, it becomes clear that Hardware Agility is not about skipping safety standards or ignoring physics. It is a rigorous approach built on three core Lean principles:

  1. Reduce Batch Size: Instead of trying to design the entire system at once, break the product down into modular subsystems with standardized interfaces. This allows individual components to be iterated without requiring a redesign of the surrounding structure.
  2. Shorten Feedback Loops: Establish a synchronized rhythm (like Saab's 3-week cadence) and invest heavily in simulation and rapid physical testing to prove concepts early.
  3. Shift Risk Left: Traditional engineering pushes integration and testing to the very end of the lifecycle, where failures are catastrophically expensive to fix. Hardware Agility shifts testing and integration to the beginning, solving hard problems when they are cheap and easy to resolve.

Pragmatic Application

Implementing hardware agility requires an organisation to step back and audit its engineering workflows. It is rarely a question of adopting a framework; it is about examining lead times, dependency structures, and where decisions get delayed.

At Everywhere Agile, we bring senior practitioners who have worked with engineering teams—including Scrum for Hardware implementations—to help you optimize these physical value streams. Our 30/70 outcomes-based commercial model means we share the risk of this transformation: you only pay the remaining 70% of our fee when you see measurable improvements in your delivery cadence and operational flow.