Canadian Shield buys compute, sensors, actuators, safety hardware and materials from Canadian and allied suppliers, and places each part on a sovereign supply-chain register by criticality, with a substitute beside it. A screened enquiry starts the conversation.
The floor makes the tool, the moulding, the fitting and the fire control. It buys the part that has to be made elsewhere, and made again by someone else if the first source fails.
Most of a Canadian Shield round is made on the floor it is assembled on. The owned 5-axis cell cuts cavity, core and inserts in-house; moulding presses and a process engineer sit on the same floor; fittings, launcher hardware, jigs and gauges are machined in the same bay as the moulds; and the fire-control and flight stack is built in-house.
The register is for everything else: the compute, sensors, actuators and safety hardware in every platform and in the CDNS Autonomy conversion kit behind Responder CS-810 and Defender CS-820, and the materials the moulds are fed with.
Safety authority does not run on bought compute. The independent safety path is separated from AI and task software, and no core safety action depends on the general-purpose compute stack.
Mission runtime executes locally, and a supported release operates and recovers without a network. Compute dependencies are abstracted so a future GPU or CPU migration does not require redesigning the machine-control boundary.
Independent perception, dynamic-state sensing and instrument observation: what a conversion kit reads the machine and the ground with. Safety-relevant sensors carry diagnostics and a defined failure response.
A machine-specific actuator and mount kit, engineered around six interface families: dual-axis hand control, rotary control, linear foot control, discrete control, instrument observation and dynamic-state sensing.
An independent safety energy path separated from AI and task software, with pneumatic dump and enable control, and a physical stop and manual release on every actuator. Actual neutral evidence outranks commanded neutral.
Every structural part is moulded glass-filled nylon, with the resin certified where structure depends on it. Recycled Alberta PET is strictly non-structural: housings, covers and the cheapest moulded bodies in the fleet. Battery-powered platforms share one battery-pack standard, so packs, chargers and spares are one inventory across the fleet.
AI plans. Rules govern. Humans authorize. Safety has veto. Nothing in the fleet transmits by radio, nothing guides on a link, and no warhead, fuze or energetic material exists anywhere in it.
Sovereignty is defined by control and recoverability, not by the nationality of every component. The register is where that definition is kept, part by part.
The supply-chain half of that is a maintained register of critical dependencies, each with a substitution plan, ordered by criticality. Every entry on the approved component list behind it carries the same six facts.
| What the register records | What it means for a supplier |
|---|---|
| Origin | Where the part is designed and made, and under whose control. |
| Lifecycle | How long the part will be made and supported. Obsolescence is managed for compute, storage, sensors and connectors. |
| Lead time | How long a replacement takes to arrive. Systems are repaired, calibrated and recovered domestically. |
| Export sensitivity | Whether the part is controlled, in Canada or in the supplier's own country. Controlled goods leave Canada only under permits issued per shipment. |
| Single-source risk | Whether the part has one maker. A single source is recorded as a risk, and a risk carries a plan. |
| Substitutes | The parts that could take its place. A supplier who names one has done part of the work. |
Criticality sets the order; substitution sets the plan.
Fire control, autonomous seekers and guidance electronics never leave Canada, and detect, track and cue are owned capability, built in-house and not sourced through a partner. The register begins where the floor stops. Development, test and production signing authority are separated, and every firmware, software, model and calibration package is signed. The full control argument is on Sovereignty; the floor itself is on Manufacturing.
A submission is read against the register, so it is written in the register's own terms.
A submission is not a bid, and nothing on this site is an offer; a quote follows scope.
The edge of the register is fixed by the doctrine of the fleet and the discipline of the floor.
The limits are the same for a supplier as for a buyer, and they do not move.
What follows a screened enquiry is a place on the register, earned through qualification, not a purchase order.
After screening, a supplier reaches the second tier of disclosure: program briefs, sanitised interface descriptions, the qualification plan, and the supplier and production overview. Configuration records come under agreement; drawings and bills of materials come only under NDA, export and security controls. Moving between tiers is an agreement, not a click.
Export posture is counsel-first. Controlled goods leave Canada only under permits issued per shipment by Global Affairs Canada, and Controlled Goods Program status is disclosed to qualified enquiries. Nothing submitted creates an obligation, and no order exists until a contract does.
Name the part, the family it serves, and as many of the six register facts as you hold.
Screened before any discussion; a qualified enquiry reaches the supplier and production overview.
Inspection, non-conformance handling, and the part's standing against the environmental domains.
The part joins the approved component list with its six facts recorded, in order of criticality.
A screened enquiry starts it, and the register is what the answer is written against.
A local supply chain that can be audited is the capability. It is the argument Canadian Shield makes at home and hands to an ally through the Forward Manufacturing Cell, where Goose CS-110 is moulded in-country from local feedstock, and it is assembled one register entry at a time. An allied supplier placed to assemble or manufacture locally can take the conversation to the Forward Manufacturing Cell.
Name the part, its origin and its substitute. The people who run the program read every enquiry and answer against the register. Everything else goes to Contact.
