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Wizz Air contracts FLYdocs to perform Records Management Services

The leading low-cost airline in Central and Eastern Europe becomes the first operator using AMOS to benefit from FLYdocs’ revolutionary aircraft compliance management services

Wizz Air awarded Flydocs with a long term contract for its advanced aviation data and records management platform to build digital aircraft compliance-on-demand for their entire fleet of 73 Airbus A320 and Airbus A321 aircraft. Work is scheduled to start with the scanning of the back-to-birth records in Budapest before the end of 2016. 

Earlier this year FLYdocs and AMOS started a collaboration to deliver the world’s first and full digital aircraft compliance on-demand. “The interfaces between FLYdocs and AMOS will offer a huge number of features that enable customers to substantially cut the time to manage aircraft compliance. This is a major step enabling full digital aircraft compliance-on-demand”, explains Adrian Ryan, CEO of FLYdocs. As Wizz Air already uses the planning and maintenance software AMOS, they will become the first airline to benefit from the advanced interfaces between the two systems.

AMOS will feed all relevant maintenance data into FLYdocs which will automatically build compliance documentation in near real-time providing Wizz Air with fully digitalised end-to-end aircraft compliance management. Through selecting FLYdocs, Wizz Air will be well placed to proactively manage its forthcoming aircraft transition programme and will enable smooth and efficient transactions.

Heiko Holm, Technical Director at Wizz Air, commented “FLYdocs has successfully completed lease return projects for Wizz Air in the past, which gave us great insight into the power of their system.  Now with full access to FLYdocs, we have the right platform to manage all of our records across the entire portfolio The wide business and technical support services FLYdocs provides is also expected to add significant value to our operations as we continue to expand and transition aircraft.” 

Adrian Ryan, CEO of FLYdocs adds “I am delighted that Wizz Air has become the first FLYdocs customer to benefit from our full digital aircraft compliance-on-demand, enabled by the seamless interface with AMOS and we are sure that many operators will follow and benefit from this huge advantage in the near future.”

Contact and more information: 

Jen Adams

FLYdocs 

+44 782 777 8719

jen.adams@flydocs.aero

www.flydocs.aero

Panasonic Avionics Partners With Safety Line to Deliver Airline Fuel Savings

LAKE FOREST – 28 November, 2016 – Panasonic Avionics Corporation (Panasonic) and Safety Line today unveiled a strategic partnership that will enable airlines to benefit from significant fuel savings.

Panasonic Weather Solutions (PWS) provides Safety Line with enhanced global weather forecast through real-time weather data collection from its TAMDAR sensors and FlightLinkTM Iridium system.

TAMDAR data provides observations of wind, temperature, and moisture every five seconds as TAMDAR-equipped aircraft descend and ascend at nearly 300 airports across North America. It also collects about 3,500 profiles each day from several hundred additional airports located in East Asia, the Pacific, and Europe.

This data is used by Panasonic’s Forecasting Center of Excellence (FCoE), which develops detailed station-based weather forecasting, as well as enhanced weather forecasting.

Panasonic’s expert meteorologists will use these unique atmospheric datasets, as well as sophisticated 4D quality control and proprietary forecasting models, to provide Safety Line with state-of-the-art and unmatched forecasts.

OptiClimb from Safety Line uses such highly accurate, real-time refreshed PWS weather forecasts in lieu of the standard weather parameters to offer optimized climb profiles for each flight.

The process is fully automated from the weather live feed to flight plan analysis and climb schedule issuance to the pilot.

Airlines can reduce fuel consumption by up to 10 percent during ascent thanks to OptiClimb’s unique patented solution, which uses a combination of machine learning performance models for each individual aircraft, and the computing of optimized climb profiles issued ahead of each flight.

Transavia is the launch customer for OptiClimb, and will use the solution in the operation of its fleet of 26 Boeing 737-800 aircraft.

PWS FlightLink weather sounding and tracking system is already in service on 35 Airbus A320 aircraft at Air Asia, and there are 250 aircraft in service globally with PWS TAMDAR weather sensors.

Chris Lundquist, VP Corporate Strategic Innovations said: “This partnership with Safety Line further develops our proven weather forecasting strategy and delivers clear bottom line benefits for airlines.”

Pierre Jouniaux, founder and CEO of OptiClimb added: “Optimization is highly reliant on the accuracy of the inputs fed into the algorithms. Panasonic Weather Solutions’ accurate, real-time forecasts allow us to optimize climb profiles more efficiently, saving more fuel dollars and CO2 for our joint customers.”

Lufthansa Systems develops new generation of aircraft navigation

Nov 28, 2016

Dynamic navigation maps enable seamless navigation from gate to gate

Lufthansa Systems today announced that it is developing dynamic navigation maps for its Lido/Navigation product line. A fully dynamic map solution is expected to be completed by 2019. With this development, the aviation IT specialist is responding to increasing digitalization and connectivity on the flight deck.

“Dynamic navigation maps are the future. They enable seamless navigation from gate to gate, without limits. Furthermore, connected systems can provide updates in real time and supply smart information that is only shown to pilots when they need it. This gives pilots a better overview, reduces their head-down time and helps them make decisions. It will also improve the display of integrated solutions for weather or other air traffic, for example,” said Stefan Auerbach, CEO of Lufthansa Systems.

Lufthansa Systems is a pioneer when it comes to navigation solutions for airlines. More than 100 airlines worldwide use charts from the Lido/Navigation solution. The paper-based Lido/RouteManual charts were released in 2002, and in 2005 Lufthansa Systems began offering digital charts, initially for integrated flight deck systems, and now in the form of apps for Windows (Lido/eRouteManual) and iOS (Lido/mPilot). All of the charts are in color, directly display minimum safe altitudes on the approach and departure charts and include true-to-scale topographical information which meets the highest standards of precision and quality.

Unlike the route maps, the digital airport charts are largely static, and there is a separation between the terminal charts and the enroute module. In practice, this means that pilots use the terminal charts during takeoff and landing and then have to manually switch to the enroute module for the flight. The Lido/AMM Airport Moving Map, which is used to navigate between the runway and the gate, is already fully dynamic in itself, but it is still separate from the other charts. This dynamic approach is now gradually being expanded.

When all of the maps – terminal, enroute and airport – are dynamic, there will no longer be any separation between the maps for various phases of a flight. Pilots will be able to zoom directly from the enroute display into the Airport Moving Map, or move straight into the flight phase after takeoff. The advantage of this is that all flight processes from gate to gate can be seamlessly displayed in a single view. “Dynamic navigation maps are the basis for smart additional functions that will be available in the future thanks to connectivity. Through its connectivity with the aircraft, the system will be able to display the precise information that is important in a specific flight situation, thus increasing the pilots’ situational awareness,” Auerbach said.

This vision of dynamic maps and new developments for Lido/Navigation and the Lido/Flight flight planning solution will be presented this week by Lufthansa Systems at the 10th Annual Flight Operations Conference in London (November 29 to 30).

Images (copyright Lufthansa Systems): Vision visualized – in a video about the dynamic future of aviation navigation (https://youtu.be/L7Tlstws6tE).

Lufthansa Systems – 15 years of expertise in aircraft navigation. The attached graphic illustrates the most important milestones in the development of Lido/Navigation.

Air Dolomiti signs CROSSMOS contract

After thoroughly testing CROSSMOS, Air Dolomiti finally decided to implement CrossConsense’s electronic technical logbook in its fleet. Air Dolomiti S.p.A owned by Lufthansa, being an Italian regional airline with its head office in Dossobuono, Villafranca di Verona, Italy, is operating a fleet of 10 Embraer E-195. The new technology will be introduced to speed up all the processes and to minimize errors in TLB data management by crew and maintenance staff. With CROSSMOS both cockpit crew and maintenance staff can report and close or defer technical malfunctions in a simple, clear and smart way.

Marco Tognini, Air Dolomiti’s eTLB Project manager, says: 

I have been involved in eTLB project since 2015 testing several solutions. We decided for CROSSMOS because we immediately appreciate how easy is its use. We are confident that nobody will miss paper once it will be implemented in our fleet. I am sure that it will probably be the eTLB for airlines in near future!

Avianca Holdings continues to rely on Codeshare Management solution from Lufthansa Systems

Nov 24, 2016

SchedConnect contract extended for another five years

Lufthansa Systems today announced that Avianca Holdings will continue to manage its codeshare connections with SchedConnect. This solution from Lufthansa Systems flexibly adapts the management of codeshare flights to schedule changes and offers a high degree of automation. This enables Avianca to optimize its codeshare management while reducing costs and enhancing its competitiveness. The company recently signed a five-year contract extension for the solution.

“Even though we are pleased with the Lufthansa Systems numerous products we are using already, we evaluated the codeshare management solutions of several IT providers. Especially the concept of having a system with central flight repository and real time schedule synchronization in Avianca’s airline group leads to essential benefits for us. The comprehensive codeshare management features, the high automation and synchronization of schedules within the Star Alliance airlines and beyond is a great unique selling proposition (USP) of Lufthansa Systems’ SchedConnect solution,” said Eduardo Asmar, Senior Vice President Strategy and Network at Avianca Holdings. “We expect this to deliver significant cost savings as well as additional revenues.”

SchedConnect offers a high level of automation by receiving and sending schedule data of over 150 airlines worldwide and calculating the optimal codeshare connections for the current customer schedules on a daily basis. Each and every month, five million codeshare connections on average are calculated using SchedConnect. If a minimum connecting time cannot be ensured due to a schedule change or if a partner flight is canceled, SchedConnect assigns the marketing flight number to another suitable connecting flight operated by the partner. Changes are sent through the reservation systems to travel agents and customers as well as to the operations and passenger-related systems of the airlines involved.

Avianca Holdings and Lufthansa Systems have been commercial partners since 2004. “Avianca Holdings already uses several products from our NetLine suite as well as ProfitLine/Price and Lido/Flight. Additional solutions like NetLine/Ops and NetLine/Crew are currently being implemented,” said Greg Cork, Senior Vice President Regional Management Americas at Lufthansa Systems. “By renewing this contract, we are further expanding our long-standing partnership with a strategically important customer.”

Based in Panama, Avianca Holdings is the parent group of Avianca Colombia and the TACA Group, which in turn includes regional carriers Lacsa – Costa Rica, TACA International – El Salvador, Aviateca – Guatemala, TACA de Honduras and TACA Peru. Other group airlines include Aerogal – Ecuador and Avianca Cargo. The Avianca Holdings airlines specialize in air cargo and passenger transport and operate a combined fleet of 155 aircraft. Overall, the subsidiary airlines serve 100 direct destinations in 26 countries in North, Central and South America. Avianca Holdings is a Star Alliance member, which enables it to offer its passengers connections to more than 1,300 airports in 192 countries worldwide.

Caption (Copyright: Manfred Nerlich): Lufthansa Systems’ SchedConnect facilitates the handling of complex codeshare connections for the airlines of Avianca Holdings.

34 percent of new IFS customers choose IFS Managed Cloud on Microsoft Azure

• IFS reports increase in customers running IFS Applications™ in the Cloud

IFS, the global enterprise applications company, announced today at IFS World Conference 2016 in Gothenburg, Sweden, that the company’s fully managed, single-tenant cloud offering has been well received by the market with more than one third of new customers opting for cloud-based enterprise software.

First launched on May 5, 2015 at IFS World Conference in Boston, the IFS Managed Cloud on Microsoft Azure is a security-enhanced single-tenant cloud for IFS products within the world-class Azure environment. It allows customers to run IFS Applications as a fully managed service, with 24x7x365 support.

Over the past year, 34 percent of new customers in IFS’s three biggest regions (the Americas, Western Europe, and Scandinavia), have chosen to deploy IFS Applications 9 in the cloud to leverage the solution’s flexible and cost-effective architecture. IFS customers run IFS Managed Cloud in seven Microsoft Azure data centres in the US, Europe, and Asia.

“We are very pleased to see how well our fully managed cloud offering has been received in the market,” IFS CEO Alastair Sorbie said. “The flexibility, security, and reliability of IFS Managed Cloud on Microsoft Azure has resonated very well among companies in our target audience. Leveraging the global network of Azure data centers, we are pleased to offer new and existing clients a future-proof cloud solution that minimises risk, cost, and complexity.”

General Manager, Developer Experiences, Microsoft, Neil Leslie added, “Microsoft Azure is an innovative cloud platform that provides our customers and partners with a secure, globally available infrastructure to capitalise on digital transformation. We are pleased to see the rapid adoption of the IFS Managed Cloud on Microsoft Azure and we look forward to continuing our successful collaboration.”

Qatar Airways moves to AeroDocs automated web-based documentation management system across entire airline group

Airline introduces fully-integrated web-based hosting of policies and manuals for real-time access and authoring

Qatar Airways and subsidiary companies all using live web documentation management 

21 November 2016 – DUBLIN, Ireland

The Qatar Airways Group has gone ‘live’ with a state-of-the-art documentation management system to enable the airline and its subsidiaries to host and share corporate manuals and policies with staff in real-time.

Qatar Airways has implemented AeroDocs software from Arconics, a ViaSat company, to provide a single centralised repository to revise and track all operational and non-operational company manuals and documentation for operational readiness. The ability to create, author, edit and mark all changes in a visible manner over the web enables team members to easily keep abreast of, and be alerted to, relevant procedural modifications as and when they happen.

From a safety and security standpoint, the carrier has been pro-active in following an IOSA recommendation to have documentation managed under “a centralised corporate scheme of document hierarchy”. The system provides the tools necessary to establish a routine regulatory compliance programme.

Qatar Airways administrators now have real-time visibility of a highly efficient distribution process, which ensures that various outputs such as web browsers, laptops and electronic flight bags, are simultaneously synchronised and all staff have access to the current version of documents. Arconics has integrated AeroDocs into existing Qatar Airways Group systems to minimise the operational overhead, and ensure accuracy of information and consistency across all systems.

Qatar Airways Senior Vice President, Group Safety and Security, Mr. Ashish Jain remarked: “With Qatar Airways’ exponential growth, we invest in technology that will integrate our teams and create efficient platforms that cut across time zones and barriers. With this live corporate documentation management system, the web-based functionality created especially for Qatar Airways, allows us to maintain consistency, regulatory compliance and quality control in a manner that is in line with our business growth plans.”

Furthermore, the system allows authors to collaborate more easily with best-in-class web-based editing functionality and document owners and regulators can manage and approve new revisions seamlessly. With the AeroDocs system, corporate policies and manuals can be viewed from mobile devices and configured for defined user groups too.

The accessibility of the web-based hosting system allows Qatar Airways to equip its staff with regular updates and ease of access to review essential corporate manuals and provides the tools to establish a routine regulatory compliance programme. Qatar Airways employees will be further trained on the system via an innovative digital learning module blended with brief instructor led workshops.

Arconics Chief Executive Officer, Mr. Niall O’Sullivan remarked: “Success in safety and compliance depends on shared knowledge that is communicated via an airline’s documentation. By enabling subject matter experts to collaborate more effectively and providing real-time tracking and management of the publication and distribution process, we strengthen safety and compliance across the enterprise. 

“One of the most satisfying elements of this successful deployment of AeroDocs has been the high level of collaboration between the Qatar Airways project team and the project managers and developers at Arconics. By working closely together, we have built a system that will keep Qatar Airways at the leading edge of safety and compliance for many years to come.”

AeroDocs, the safety and compliance document management system for aviation is now available for deployment to airlines worldwide. AeroDocs will be demonstrated at the 10th Annual Flight Ops Conference, LHR, 29-30 November 2016

NAVBLUE To Increase Vietnam Airspace Efficiency

Thursday, November 17th, 2016 

NAVBLUE completes deal with Vietnam Air Traffic Management Corporation (VATM) and Airbus to deliver Optimized Airspace Design of Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh areas to enhance safety and efficiency 

NAVBLUE, the new Airbus subsidiary dedicated to flight operations and air traffic management, announced today that it has finalized a contract to implement the ATM Cooperation Program in Vietnam to enhance safety and efficiency. The project will focus on the country’s two largest airports in Ho Chi Minh City and Ha Noi to realize gains from both an international perspective as well as from a flow-efficiency perspective between the two cities. 


With an anticipated air-passenger annual growth rate of 16-18%, the VATM and Civil Aviation Authority of Vietnam (CAAV) believe it’s necessary for the country to start building today procedures, technologies and skill sets that will support the ongoing increase in demand at its existing two busiest airports– Tan Son Nhat International Airport and Noi Bai International Airport.


Said Mr. Pham Viet Dzung – Director General of VATM, “The increased air traffic capacity generated from this project will bolster the growing Vietnamese economy with its spin-off double-digit growth and intensification of air passengers, while respecting the environmental and social impact of this growth.” 


The project delivered over a three-year period and will include a comprehensive air traffic management analysis including a safety assessment, a redesign of existing sectors and designs making extensive use of Performance Based Navigation (PBN) and a change programme with training and cultural management components. 


Of note to the contract is its customized approach to a complex and challenging, multi-stakeholder project that sees each party agree on common goals that reward each stakeholder. This collaborative approach allows for the country to lay out an actionable plan that ensures truly sustainable future air traffic. The project will see collaboration between the country’s three top airlines Vietnam Airlines, VietJet Air, and Jetstar Pacific, Tan Son Nhat International Airport and Noi Bai International Airport in conjunction with VATM and the CAAV. 

Said the NAVBLUE Chief Commercial & Communication Officer, Paul-Franck Bijou, “This project has all the benefits that NAVBLUE, as a subject matter expert organization, likes to get involved with by helping our customers, airlines, airports and civil aviation authorities, to succeed in building today so that they may sustainably embrace the future of an increasingly mobile society.” 

IFS showcases solution concept to derive business value from drones and IoT

• IFS Labs unveils innovative projects designed to drive digital transformation

IFS, the global enterprise applications company, presents a proof-of-concept solution that empowers maintenance workers with drone technology integrated with IFS Applications™. The drone concept was presented at the IFS World Conference 2016 in Gothenburg, Sweden.

Designed and realised by IFS Labs, the company’s in-house think tank, the drone proof-of-concept features live integration between the drone and IFS Applications for automatic generation of work orders when inspecting assets.

Using computer image analysis, the drone can recognise a break in a power line and automatically generate an observation that is registered in IFS Applications via the IFS IoT Business Connector. The end user can analyse and process the drone observations via the IFS Lobby interface, in which additional information such as geolocation and customer feedback is cross-referenced to help the user action appropriate maintenance and repair.

“At IFS Labs, we look beyond the current needs of businesses to anticipate what solutions will be required in the future,” IFS Labs director Bas de Vos said. “There is enormous potential in drone technology and by presenting this proof-of-concept, we have demonstrated that IFS is ready to help companies not only conceptualise but importantly derive value from new innovations so they can digitally transform their businesses.”

Also presented in the Innovation Area of IFS World Conference 2016 were innovative business applications leveraging the Internet of Things (IoT), augmented reality, wearable technology, beacon technology, and 3D printing.

ViaSat Acquires Arconics for Added Aircraft Operations Capabilities 

• ViaSat Gains Connected Aircraft Software, Wireless In-flight Entertainment, Mobile Applications and Airline Document Management Expertise
• Arconics Brings A Complementary Set of Existing Commercial Airline Customers, Including Qatar Airways, Cathay Pacific, Ryanair, Aer Lingus, Among Others

CARLSBAD, Calif. and DUBLIN, November 14, 2016 – ViaSat Inc. (NASDAQ: VSAT), a global broadband services and technology company, today announced it acquired Arconics, an innovative provider of software solutions to the aviation industry. Through this acquisition ViaSat gains broader expertise, aviation-grade software and mobile applications to make flying safer and more efficient for pilots, cabin crews and flight operations teams as well as applications that make entertaining passengers and opening new service and revenue opportunities for airlines possible.

The Arconics connected aircraft software platform enables the Arconics App Suite, which spans wireless In-flight Entertainment (IFE), Electronic Flight Bag (EFB), Airline Document Management and Cabin Management solutions, to communicate and share data with the aircraft and, using available connectivity, to connect with ground systems across mobile or avionics platforms. Today, tens of thousands of pilots, ground staff and cabin crew members across five continents depend on Arconics software to safely and efficiently operate their fleets. Airline customers include: Qatar Airways, Cathay Pacific, Ryanair, Aer Lingus, Philippine Airlines, Tigerair Australia, SpiceJet and others.

“By acquiring Arconics, we are bolstering our ability to serve the global aviation market,” said Don Buchman, vice president and general manager, Commercial Mobility business, ViaSat. “We believe combining our strengths with Arconics will position ViaSat to be the market leader for connectivity, passenger services and flight deck applications and operations.”

Prior to the acquisition, Arconics had a partnership with ViaSat, primarily focused on serving the wireless IFE needs of multiple airline customers. Post-acquisition, ViaSat expects to also offer airlines real-time insight, control and agility of aircraft and flight data with highly-integrated, highly-customizable aircraft operations tools that tap into the power of ViaSat’s advanced high capacity Ka-band satellite network, which has more capacity in orbit than any other in-flight WiFi provider.

“ViaSat offers Arconics a strategic match – both culturally and technologically,” said Arconics Chief Executive Officer Niall O’Sullivan. “We know ViaSat well, having partnered with them on a number of opportunities to deliver our world-class CloudStore wireless IFE product. Together, we believe the complementary nature of the technologies and products of Arconics and ViaSat will enhance the combined company’s ability to deliver exceptional end-to-end experiences across the entire aircraft value-chain.” 

In connection with the acquisition, ViaSat establishes a presence in Dublin, Ireland, and will continue to build its operations in Sydney, Australia. More than 30 Arconics team members with both technical and business expertise will join ViaSat, including Niall O’Sullivan. IBI Corporate Finance advised Arconics on the transaction. The transaction is not expected to materially affect ViaSat non-GAAP (pro forma) earnings for fiscal year 2017. However, ViaSat has not completed its valuation analysis and, accordingly, has not determined the impact to GAAP earnings.