Amendment Proposed to National Defense Authorization Act Reiterates Need for Right to Repair Exemptions

Last month, the Senate Committee on Armed Services convened to discuss the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for FY 2025. This annual review is essential to confirm that the U.S. military and key defense initiatives are equipped with sufficient funding and legal powers required to fulfill their duties.

Ensuring the full functionality of the military is essential for our national defense and safety, but a newly proposed amendment introduced by Senator Warren could bring unwanted consequences for a plethora of industries.

The current draft of the provision seeks to implement a comprehensive right-to-repair policy – a topic that has sparked conversations in over 30 states nationwide and is steadily gaining support. Should this policy be enacted, it would impact all original equipment manufacturers (OEMs), authorized dealers, or contractors that supply products or services to the Department of Defense.

Consequently, this policy could have implications for any company that is a part of the defense industrial base or engaged in the Department of Defense’s supply chain, necessitating compliance with these regulations.

These regulations would be certain to cast an umbrella over a wide variety of industries, but one thing that remains certain is the need to treat all industries separately as they all have unique needs that must be met and not lumped into an overarching rule to abide by.

In particular, the medical device industry must be exempt from any right to repair policies as this proprietary and intricate medical equipment cannot afford anything that could cause a failure or jeopardize device functionality. Patient’s lives are on the line.

Recently, the Advanced Medical Technology Association (AdvaMed) wrote a letter to the Senate Armed Services Committee highlighting how the proposed provision will “introduce significant risks to competition, patient and operator safety, medical device performance, and cybersecurity, and compromises legitimate intellectual property rights of the medical device manufacturers.” The organization urged the Committee to strike the specific section from the FY2025 NDAA and “refrain from enacting any similar mandate.”

It is crucial for both the Senate Committee on Armed Services and the Department of Defense to exercise due diligence in guaranteeing that each device covered under the proposed right-to-repair policy receives individual consideration.