CMMC vs Essential Eight — What Australian Defence Contractors in AUKUS Supply Chains Need to Know

Australian defence contractors participating in AUKUS Pillar II programs face dual compliance obligations: the Essential Eight Maturity Model (required for DISP) and CMMC 2.0 (required for US DoD contracts). The two frameworks have significant overlap — approximately 60% of CMMC Level 2 practices map to Essential Eight ML2 controls — but CMMC 2.0 has additional requirements around incident response, supply chain risk management, and audit logging. DISPulse maps your environment to both frameworks simultaneously, identifying the delta between your current E8ML2 posture and CMMC Level 2 requirements.