Welcome aboard: Navy shipyard crews going paperless

The Navy shipyard maintenance operations are finally going paperless. The service has awarded Accenture Federal Services a maximum $16.3 million contract to develop a new maintenance system that accommodates mobile devices and will replace paper work instructions, reference materials, technical drawings and work control forms, the company announced.

Called the electronic Technical Work Documents, or eTWD, will give maintenance workers and supervisors a tablet-based electronic work package that will cover all aspects of shipyard maintenance, including planning and scheduling, filling out maintenance forms and managing activities, the company said.

In addition to holding all those forms and documents, the tablets will keep information updated and enable real-time collaboration on the job. In addition to making operations more efficient, the Navy is hoping that the mobile system will save money over using paper-based processes.

Accenture said the system will be standardized at the Navy’s four public shipyards at Portsmouth, Maine, Norfolk, Va., Puget Sound, Wash., and Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.

“Navy eTWD is a critical initiative for the Department of the Navy’s Ship Depot Maintenance Program,” Vince Vlasho, who leads Accenture’s work with the Navy, said in a statement. “It will dramatically improve the way maintenance is performed in the shipyards, and in turn, improve fleet readiness, making critical budget dollars available for other force structure and readiness initiatives.”

The $16.3 million figure represents the ceiling for the contract, which has a one-year base period with two, one-year options.