Part of software complexity derives from intricate connections between diffused components, which makes it hard to see all the pieces and leaves them open to vulnerability issues.
The shift toward open-source software (OSS), cloud-native engineering practices and composable resources has accelerated the software life cycle (SDLC), but it also exploded the number of dependencies. This requires strict control over individual bits of software to guarantee security and regulatory compliance.
A software bill of materials (SBOM) is one useful resource to manage and mitigate all the risks within the software supply chain.
An SBOM is a formal, detailed registry of all the parts that make up a piece of software. Think of it as a recipe that lists all the ingredients, like the code, libraries and other components (both OSS and proprietary), in a format that computers can easily read.
Unfortunately, as more industries use generative AI to be more productive, new cybersecurity dangers necessitate granular visibility into AI-generated content and detailed knowledge of how AI systems are built.
That’s why an SBOM acquires even more prominence when assessing the origin of AI generated software components or specific assets used to build AI systems (AIBOM).
An SBOM helps secure compliance, foster trust and strengthen the entire supply chain.
What Is An SBOM and How Does It Impact The SDLC?
An SBOM is a digital list of the individual parts that constitute a software artifact.
Just like food products have their own ingredients label on the envelope, an SBOM shows precisely the individual components that define a software application.
Nowadays, the majority of these components come from open-source software. The widespread use of open-source components, combined with the growing adoption of composable modular architectures to boost speed and productivity, creates an elusive network of elements.
So organizations often struggle to maintain visibility into the components of their software and are exposed to recurring security, compliance, reputational and regulatory accountability risks.
Gartner predicts that, by 2028, 85% of big companies will standardize the SBOM as a critical resource of their software development process.
An SBOM plays a key role throughout the SDLC because it gives a high extent of visibility into specific software parts, allowing organizations to navigate the complex landscape of AI-native development and AI-powered applications.
The SBOM For AI (AIBOM) Helps Manage AI Complexity And Tackle Cybersecurity
The proliferation of AI systems and AI-generated content has raised new concerns related to cybersecurity and innovative ways to attack the software supply chain.
So regulators are trying to standardize rules to make sure organizations use AI responsibly, safely, and as transparently as possible. The EU AI Act and NIS2 are only two examples of the emerging landscape that sees software compliance gain paramount importance.
After all, AI largely relies on software, inheriting the same weaknesses. Yet, AI development adds complex variables to the risk equation, such as models, learning and training techniques, datasets, safety measures, system-level features, and specific infrastructure.
An SBOM for AI, or AIBOM (AI Bill of Materials), tracks the specific ingredients to make up an AI application.
The Relationship Between An SBOM And A Software Catalog
SBOMs can be very useful, but they are instrumental in fostering transparency and software component visibility, as well as in facilitating the automation of other activities.
If taken in isolation, an SBOM isn’t so valuable because it’s a static list of components. But it becomes a fundamental tool to strengthen the supply chain when used simultaneously with other tools and resources.
One of these tools is the software catalog, which serves as a governance layer and complements the SBOM expanding its scope.
In essence, while the SBOM is a static list that details libraries, versions, licenses and dependencies for a single application, the software catalog maps those assets to the organizational context.
The most mature software catalogs can ingest SBOMs from pipelines and repositories, turning granular data from individual lists into a dynamic map. They can link a vulnerable library found in an SBOM directly to the running service, its owner, and its compliance scorecard.
The Software Catalog And The SBOM Are Crucial For AI And Composability
In an era of AI agents and composable architectures, an isolated SBOM requires complementary tools for the fluid nature of AI assets. To secure AI, organizations could pair the granular data of an SBOM with a dynamic software catalog.
This synergy is essential for these reasons:
- Governing living assets: AI models are “living” entities that evolve through retraining and fine-tuning. A static SBOM (or AIBOM) captures a single snapshot of a build, while the software catalog tracks continuous lineage of training data, model weights, and metadata for real-time governance.
- Managing composable dependencies: Modern AI development increasingly relies on composing modular parts, from APIs to vector databases and weights. The SBOM or AIBOM lists the parts; the catalog reveals the way AI models, data sources, and apps consuming such data are connected.
- Operationalizing the blast radius: The software catalog expands an SBOM’s data by mapping vulnerability propagation. If a model version has an issue, it shows affected services, teams, and environments for rapid remediation.
Use Mia-Platform To Automate An SBOM Generation and Expand Its Reach
Mia-Platform streamlines SBOM workflows with its AI-powered Quality Assistant, delivering effortless SDLC guidance tuned to standards like IEC 62304 and regulations like EU AI Act or NIS2 for every platform role, from developers to compliance leads.
Mia-Platform’s Quality Assistant can automate SBOM generation and expand its scope harnessing the software catalog as foundational knowledge. AI-driven quality evaluations spot requirement/test gaps (like coverage estimates), while smart SW item management handles AI models seamlessly.
Effort drops, quality rises with live audits, dynamic scorecards, policy guardrails, and proactive fixes across the entire stack.
This way, an SBOM evolves from just a documentation requirement to the starting point of a secure, self-correcting software life cycle.
To Sum Up
SBOMs deliver machine-readable inventories for software provenance tracking and vulnerability mitigation, which is essential in today’s agentic AI and composable era, where exploding dependencies demand dynamic AIBOMs.
Pair them with a curated software catalog for the full power: discoverability, enriched metadata, policy guardrails, runtime context, and governance to secure AI assets safely.
Mia-Platform makes it seamless: auto-generate SBOMs with Quality Assistant, expand via catalog for contextual scope and gain live traceability, compliance and trust. By doing so, you can build a resilient supply chain and improve security and vulnerability management.
