Airbus wants to prevent delayed flights with artificial intelligence

Airbus uses Artificial Intelligence (AI) and the cloud to solve various aviation problems. That’s what Adam Bonnifield, vice president of artificial intelligence at the company, said at the VentureBeat 2018 Summit. “The price of using these technologies has fallen sharply, thanks to the explosion in the availability of computing power.”

The company builds a reservoir of data for in-service aircraft, which is then made available to businesses and individual users. For example, JetBlue uses the Scheduled Maintenance Optimizer platform, which uses algorithms to determine the best maintenance schedule for over 200 aircraft. Other Airbus services include training, flight operations and air traffic management.

“We can take some of the biggest problems in our industry – aircraft on the ground, delays and other problems – and use AI to solve them forever,” says Bonnifield. “In the United States, some USD 40 billion is spent on delays, and 80% of airlines are always late. That’s because they don’t have access to certain data that helps them manage when their plane lands and before it takes off.”

Airbus’s Smarter Fleet technology is now used by more than 200 companies. Other companies are making use of the partnership with IBM, which was announced in 2013. This partnership provides operators with IT services for maintenance, engineering and flight operations.

Skywise

Last year, Airbus also started a partnership with Palantir Technologies to launch Skywise. This is a platform for big data integration and advanced analytics. The platform improves industrial operations, but also offers improved aircraft and equipment designs. In addition, it provides improved operational efficiency for older fleets and one-click reporting workflows.

Skywise data comes from various sources in the industry. These include work orders, the consumption of spare parts, sensor data on board, component data and flight schedules. All this data appears in a single dashboard. The aim is to combine all this data into a secure platform for storage, management and analysis. In addition, users need to gain insight into their fleet of aircraft and their level worldwide.