NZ technology has lofty aims

By YOKE HAR LEE

Imminent changes in the way we manage international airspace are expected to dramatically impact on the companies who provide the technology.

And when the changes occur, a tiny organisation in the South Pacific - Airways Corporation (NZ) - will be in among the big boys looking for jobs and the chance to show how it's done.

Airways is one of the first organisations in the world to set up a satellite-based system to manage air space over oceans - a move which could yield airlines millions of dollars in fuel and time savings. It will also give aviation authorities better control of airspace and raise the efficiency of airports.

Airways chief executive Craig Sinclair told the Business Herald: "We have a view of how we see the industry developing over the next 10 years. There will be a rationalisation of services.

"We intend to be one of the players in the rationalisation."

Airways is a state-owned organisation set up in 1987 which provides air navigation services and consultancy services - among others - and it has now teamed with multi-billion dollar company Lockheed Martin ATM and Canada's Adacel Technologies. The three-way cooperative is to bid for a slice of the US Federal Aviation Authority's move to modernise airspace management over oceans.

Mr Sinclair said since the end of the Cold War governments have had diminished influence over control of airspace, although the technology being offered airspace is improving.

"The reality now is the business is technology-driven, and the service offered is by one of the most competitive industries in the world."

The traditional models through government-controlled organisations providing the know-how in airspace management were being broken, Mr Sinclair said.

"Governments are starting to realise the business they are in is not sovereign responsibility," he added.

They also realised that government entities had no resource to manage the technology issues. Money was available to install the technologies needed but the private sector wanted assurance that the money would be spent under private sector disciplines.

Mr Sinclair said Britain recognised problems with air traffic control management could be fixed by the private sector and that had led to a push for public-private sector partnership to improve performance levels.

"We are watching the UK [part privatisation of air traffic control system] closely. It offers massive, unprecedented value in terms of validating the views we have on the issue," he said.

Dr Dale Seastrom, vice president of Lockheed Martin ATM's business development, said economic pressure was also rationalising air traffic management.

In Europe for instance, for an area covering the same size as the US, there were some 46 different air traffic navigation systems in place, while the US had 20 area centres.

"The consequence is this drives up the air ticket price and makes air travel more expensive in Europe.

"It also contributes to air traffic congestion. The European Union is putting pressure on its members to rectify the problem, and that's where the drive for rationalisation will come from."

Dr Seastrom said when it was putting together its own business plan in terms of what it would pitch for, it realised that the future was to be found not only in selling hardware or software.

"There is a real paradigm shift - to the focus of providing services rather than someone buying a piece of equipment for a particular need."

The high-technology giant needed a partner with operational skills - one that understood safety issues - and that was the thinking behind the Lockeed-Airways partnership to bid for the FAA business.

The backdrop to these strategies is a landscape littered with failed technologies.

In fact, the FAA has had to deal with hiccups in system upgrades, due to technologies not being able to interface either with one another, or indeed with humans.