From Assistance To Self Service
The future of air transport will be driven by big techno-trends and practices that will underpin the digital transformation in the industry globally. The role of technology has never been as critical in transforming air travel as it has become today and will provide real value to help the industry navigate the future.
With the aviation industry being on a high growth trajectory, Asia Pacific is leading the tremendous growth in the air travel industry. By 2036, the region is expected to handle over 4.1 billion passengers — more than half of the world’s passenger traffic. The annual number of passengers being handled globally is expected to surpass 4.3 billion by 2018 end.
Industry reports suggest that India will become the third largest market by the end of 2023. With this growth comes challenges and stresses on infrastructure and processes. The only way to handle such unprecedented growth is through adoption of innovative, cutting edge and newer technology which has the potential to create a journey that’s secure, smooth and seamless, from end-to-end not just for the passengers but for the crew as well.
A recent study commissioned by SITA revealed that today’s passenger increasingly prefers self-service, automated and mobile technologies over assisted ones. This finding only reinforces the fact that passengers are ready and keen to use self-operated services.
In a hugely interdependent aviation ecosystem, the time has truly come to embrace technology to connect stakeholders and assets in unparalleled ways.
New innovative technologies will bring profound transformation by not just connecting the assets but also their audience in a more effective and seamless ways. The fact is that smart use of technology ranging from mixed reality, Artificial Intelligence (AI), robotics, Internet of Things (IoT), machine learning, biometrics and blockchain are only going to help manage the challenges of rising passenger numbers, limited infrastructure and increased complexity with ease.
All these technologies can easily be integrated into the existing infrastructure, eventually leading to reducing costs and smooth functioning.
Biometrics is becoming more commonplace at airports around the world and is delivering secure seamless travel from check-in to boarding. It has the potential to decrease wait time and make journey paperless. These solutions have already been operating worldwide in countries like Australia, USA, Mexico and the Middle East.
By embracing the Internet of Things and connecting everything across the industry we will produce more data which can be used with artificial intelligence to create valuable insights and expose new ways of working. Intelligent machines which are cross overs of IoT and AI can do basic tasks that make the passenger journey better.
Over the next 20 years, use of digital technologies to improve service, operations and efficiency will have profound effects on the air transport industry. Artificial Intelligence (AI) will enhance airport and aircraft planning and administrative processes. Combined with advanced machine learning, AI can be used to forecast aircraft arrival times, weather, news and much more as far out as 24 hours giving airports the opportunity to proactively manage and mitigate disruption.
AI has the potential to take it to another level by pre-empting passengers’ questions based on their biometric data.
Mixed reality can empower airport authorities to operate from a virtual command centre to analyse passenger and airport information real time and operate it smoothly without being physically present there. Autonomous vehicles and the potential use of robotics is another field of development which can automate processes even further.
