Airport Integration of Operational Systems, Passenger Processing & Baggage Systems

Big Data. Two words that made up the headline of most IT industry magazines over the last few years seems to have given way to the latest “cool”, such as Google Glass, iBeacon and Physical Web.

It would appear an assumption has been made that exploiting and combining the huge silos of data available, or “Big Data”, to deliver a unified business intelligence model was so evidently beneficial that, by now, everyone has fully adopted the concept and moved on. However, Ultra’s observations on the airport community indicate that a great many airports are still wrestling with the complexities of implementing common, airport wide, communication and information models.

The benefits of integrating operational or back office systems have long been understood and implemented. But what about some of the less obvious connections? Linking operations with retail, for example? How many airports would see this as having valuable and immediate benefits? Yet if we consider an airport as being in many respects like a small city, we can draw parallels with such things as: insular communities, language barriers, segregation – the list goes on. Wouldn’t it make life so much easier if everyone spoke the same language, for example?

Lack of understanding can, and often does, lead to segregation and even conflict. In an airport this directly hits customer satisfaction, productivity, and, ultimately, the bottom line.

We believe that, with the continued explosion of the smartphone industry, new and cutting edge technology such as the iBeacon has undoubted benefits to offer parts of the airport community, but it needs to be considered as only one small piece of the information jigsaw. Taking the holistic view rather than focussing in on small, latest-buzzword technologies can bring huge benefits to the efficiency and productivity of an airport.

To achieve these benefits we believe the starting point is to create a campus wide information highway that is available to the entire airport community, not just the obvious areas of commonality. It needs to be robust, standardised, easily manageable and simple to access, so that, for any stakeholder, the benefits of being linked to the global data community greatly outweigh the effort of connection. With this in place an airport can exploit the wealth of data available through the creation of a Common Information Model. The airport can then use analytical tools to collate, aggregate and transform the data into truly beneficial business intelligence that drives its continuous improvement program.

There will always be early technology adopters that consider themselves innovators within the industry; this is good, as it drives the industry forward and keeps it fresh and vital. However, unless the application of new technologies is considered in the context of the Common Information Model, it becomes just another technology looking for a practical purpose or a trial that generates transient interest before being, at best, locally adopted or, at worst, side lined. By taking the Ultra approach and ensuring appropriate infrastructure is in place first, the global airport community can properly derive the benefits of integrating and exploiting the latest cutting edge technologies.

Now let us consider this argument in the context of the emerging technologies such as iBeacon.

So what is an iBeacon and what does it do?

“iBeacon is the trademark for an indoor positioning system that Apple Inc. calls "a new class of low-powered, low-cost transmitters that can notify nearby iOS 7 or 8 devices of their presence." The technology enables a smart phone or other device to perform actions when in close proximity to an iBeacon”

In the context of an airport, the beacons can trigger a dedicated application on a smartphone or tablet to pinpoint a passenger’s exact location. This enables the application to deliver information that is contextually relevant to the proximity of the beacon. Information is logged and recorded to provide an airport with location based analytics.

It does not take a great deal of creative thinking to realise the location information being provided from the beacons can be used to enhance the passenger experience and to benefit the retail outlets within the airport campus. Benefits such as: way finding, localised airport maps, promotional vouchers for the retail outlets or restaurants in close proximity. These are useful and help for a better passenger experience but do they really bring significant measurable benefits to the airport campus’ wider community?

With Ultra’s Common Information Model approach, the data generated from the beacons would be integrated into the global data of the airport – another piece of the information jigsaw.

By having the ability to augment the beacon data with data from the wider airport community an airport can consider a far wider range of possibilities and revenue generating initiatives. Let us look at a few of these potential scenarios and the possible benefits:

Retail outlets collect and collate huge amounts of data related to their customers’ buying habits and use this for, amongst other things, voucher based promotions. However, within an airport environment, by and large, they are blind to the wider environment. They have no understanding of flight schedules, or how a delay in the schedule, for example, impacts the passengers’ purchasing profiles. By understanding the flight schedules, they could begin to build a demographic picture of purchase preferences allowing targeted promotions rather than proximity promotions.

• Restaurants could offer premium fast track services for passengers with limited time until their flight.
• Sunglasses and sun cream promotions could be targeted at passengers visiting hot climates.
• Incoming passengers could book an on-line shop before they board and have it placed in their car boot as they are passing through Arrivals, as the retail outlet would have clear visibility of the flight schedules.
• Airports could understand if changing flight situations impact passenger footfall and if so, whether certain retail outlet positions could attract a premium price for occupancy.
• In a similar vein to the recent Google Glass and smartwatch trials undertaken by airlines, the arrival of premium class passengers could be intercepted and handled in a proactive manner.
• The whereabouts in the airport of delayed transit passengers could be understood quickly and they could either be fast tracked to their flight or, if they were too far away to make it, proactively booked onto following flights or hotels to reduce the negative impact on the passenger as much as possible.
• Passengers with the potential to delay flights could be targeted with specific “Go to Gate” messages as part of a positive boarding program rather than suffering the indignity of tannoy announcements.

When the individual items above are considered as part of the drive for continuous improvement and enhanced customer experience, it becomes evident that both globalised data and an airport’s ability to direct and target that data in a timely and appropriate manner is pivotal to its success.