Autonomous vehicles identified as the most relevant strategic advance for airport
Aebi Schmidt invited over 200 airport professionals from 38 countries to an experience day on Tuesday, 8 October. The focus was on presentations and discussions on the topics of autonomous vehicles and how operation processes can be made more efficient with the help of Data Management Solutions. A live survey among the participating experts also yielded surprising results.
At the Airport Professionals Experience Day, to which Aebi Schmidt had invited, it became clear that many influencing factors determine which challenges are strategically most important for the individual airport. “The outcome of the event is consistent with our experience of the day-to-day business,” said Rudi Rosenkamp, CCO Dealer/Airports.
“There is not one solution for all, but each airport has its specific challenges,” Rosenkamp continued. At the event, Aebi Schmidt explained how the experience gained from individual test projects in the field of autonomous vehicles was incorporated into the three-step model that Aebi Schmidt and CPAC Systems AB are offering to interested customers. Theresia Winkler-Flügel, Target Group Manager Airports, presented the model together with Linus Josefsson, KAM and R&D Manager Industry Segment at CPAC Systems AB.
When asked what her advice was when it came to preparing a complex topic in the best possible way, she said that experience had shown that it was worth going step by step from small to large. Peter van de Linde, Fleet Manager Operations at Schiphol Group, advised the same for Data Management Solutions. Peter was the discussion partner of John Maree, Digital Solutions Manager at the Aebi Schmidt Group. In dialogue, they showed the audience how Schiphol Airport first started to track operations with the help of data management and then continuously optimized them.
In addition to the two focus topics, which were also spotlighted by other experts such as Martin Hofmann from Stuttgart Airport or Leonid Shipil from Vnukovo Airport, Aebi Schmidt presented its current machine and product portfolio live on the one hand and explained on the other how the company intends to develop from a product seller to a solution provider. Particular attention was paid to the new training simulator, the topic of electrification and the broad after-sales range, which Aebi Schmidt has recently expanded.
Before the Experience Day ended with a dinner next to and under the aircrafts of the German Museum in Oberschleissheim, there were a few flashy moments. A live survey showed that more than half of the experts rated the strategic relevance of the topic of autonomous vehicles as high or very high. Then, however, when asked about the priority between autonomous driving, data management, increasing the efficiency of machines and other things, the two core topics were almost the same with one third of the votes each.
Autonomous vehicles were 3 percentage points in the lead. However and clearly, only 7 percent were of the opinion that there were other strategic priorities.
Aebi Schmidt wanted to offer an Experience Day enabling a dialogue with customers and experts as it considers dialogue as indispensable in order to offer reasonable and performance enhancing products and solutions. For this reason, the event was designed in a way that this dialogue was possible both in the plenum and outside the presentations. At the end of the event, Rudi Rosenkamp was satisfied: “My colleagues and I have once again learned a lot from our customers that we will incorporate into the further development of our products and services.”
