What happens to your AS9100 and ITAR status when you sell

Why aerospace deals are different

In most manufacturing sectors a buyer reads the equipment list first. In aerospace they read the approval file: AS9100 registration, NADCAP approvals for special processes, customer-specific supplier approvals, and the first-article and corrective-action history behind all of it.

That is why a Union County shop with older machines and a clean approval file consistently out-prices a better-equipped shop without one. The approvals took years and cannot be bought any other way.

What transfers and what does not

The registration follows the legal entity and the site, which makes deal structure a practical question rather than only a tax one.

• In a stock sale, the certificate stays with the entity. Notifications are still required, and customers still re-approve under the new ownership documents.
• In an asset sale, the buying entity typically needs a transfer audit or a fresh certification against the existing quality system, and every customer approval is re-issued to the new entity.
• Under ITAR, registration is entity-specific and a change of ownership requires notification to the Directorate of Defense Trade Controls, with advance notice where a foreign person is involved and a longer review in that case.

The sequencing problem

Prime customers set their own re-approval timelines and they will not accept shipments from a supplier whose status is unresolved. A production interruption after closing is the outcome both sides are trying to avoid, and it is entirely preventable.

Experienced buyers handle this routinely by writing the sequence into the purchase agreement: who notifies whom, on what schedule, and what happens to the price if a customer withholds re-approval. A first-time buyer may not know to raise it, which makes it the seller's advisor's job.

The concentration conversation

Program concentration is structural in aerospace rather than a management failure, and buyers know it. What they price is the honesty of the schedule: each platform, your position and part numbers, rate history, expected production outlook, your share, and the competitive situation.

That document is harder to write than a sales forecast and far more persuasive. Where a platform is mature and rates are falling, the realistic conversation shifts to the value of the approvals and the capacity, and there are buyers specifically looking for approved capacity to feed with their own programs.