数据科技降低行李误处理率，为航空货运带来新可能

发布时间: 2021-07-30

       国际航空运输协会（IATA）的首席信息官帕斯卡尔-布赫纳曾说：“航空公司通常不擅长信息技术。”任何有过行李丢失或航班延误的人可能都会同意这一观点。

       但是，航空公司正在努力通过在技术方面进行大笔投资来改善这种情况。

       布赫纳表示：“航空企业们已经越来越意识到，数据是航空公司业绩的主要来源。”的确，从预测性维护、行李处理、货物跟踪到员工管理和客户忠诚度研究，数据以及相应的数据分析已经成为了航空公司如何运营成功的决定性因素之一。在一次旅行中，一名乘客可能与多达10个不同的实体互动——从航空公司、政府、地勤人员到至少两个机场。所有这些交互环节都需要安全地交换关于行李、航班和旅行文件的数据。

       据IATA说，在过去的几年里，整个行业共享的数据量已经出现了爆炸式增长。

       虽然旅行者可能没有意识到，但一次顺利的旅行在很大程度上取决于数据——从共享旅行文件到监测机场之间的行李流动。在旅行的多个步骤中跟踪你的行李并分享这些信息可以大大减少行李被误处理的可能性，事实上，根据IATA的研究显示，使用行李跟踪数据能够降低行李不当处理率达到66%。

       尽管有了这些改进，航空行李处理依然有很大提升空间。IATA在2020年的一份报告发现，2019年间全球有2540万件行李被误处理，给航空运输业造成约25亿美元的损失。

       同时，新冠的全球大流行对航空业也是一场灾难。但IATA方面认为，该行业将在2022年恢复到2019年的水平，同年，也有望恢复到收支平衡或盈利。

       而随着航空业逐渐复苏，航空领域收集的数据量也将创下新高。

       实时数据共享使机场和航空公司能够更有效地分配他们的资源，这意味着登机口、结账柜台和行李中心可以配备适当人员，机场也能更好更及时地处理天气和航班取消等意外事件。对于乘客来说，这些数据在疫情结束后的环境中也会有着极高价值。

       加拿大航空公司，已经开始收集各种形式的数据并推送给从一线到高管的各层级员工。

       加拿大航空公司安全分析与创新部经理说：“只有通过测量，我们才能改进，而现在测量可以几乎相当于实时进行。”

       传统手段中，数据是通过电子邮件、警报、PDF和简单的仪表盘来共享的。而现在，新的数据科技使加航能够通过应用程序、智能手表，甚至是沉浸式3D环境来显示数据，迅速向员工推送信息。

       这一切都使得“在正确的时间将数据呈现给正确的人”成为可能，乘客将不再需要停止他或她的日常工作、去办公室、打印出一个PDF、看一个仪表板或相应的电子邮件，然后再消化他们需要的数据。现在，乘客只需点击几下鼠标，就能调出关于加航机队状况的各种信息，而在过去，这些信息需要花费数天的时间来汇总。

       而数据整合的下一步，是能够在问题发生前很久就发现它们——知道飞机上的某个部件在其寿命结束前需要更换，或者预测它的故障并采取相应的行动。类似的粗略估算现在已经存在，但是大数据将使这种预估的精准性大大提升，从而使航空公司不仅可以选择更换什么，而且可以选择在哪里和何时更换。

       到目前为止，大数据科技已经影响到了货运和机场运营中8000多名团队成员的工作，以及3万多名客户，为航空与货运的管理带来了新的可能。

原文：

"Airlines are not usually very good at information technology," says Pascal Buchner, the chief information officer of the International Air Transport Association (IATA) - the trade association for the world's airlines.

Anyone who has had their baggage lost, or their flight delayed, would probably agree.

But airlines are betting they can improve the situation by making big investments in technology.

"We now know that data is the main source of performance for airlines," says Mr Buchner.

From predictive maintenance, baggage handling and cargo tracking to staff management and customer loyalty programmes, data - and how all this information is analysed - has rapidly become one of the most important factors in determining how an airline operates successfully.

"During a single trip, a passenger may interact with up to 10 different entities - from airlines, government, ground handlers to at least two airports - all of which requires the secure exchange of data on baggage, flight and travel documents," points out Jacques Demael, senior vice president of strategy and business support at SITA, an aviation-focused global IT firm headquartered in Geneva.

According to Mr Demael, the amount of data shared across the industry has "exploded" over the last few years.

While travellers may not be aware of it, a smooth trip is largely dependent on data, from sharing travel documentation to monitoring the flow of baggage between airports.

"The ability to track your bag across multiple steps in the journey and share that information… significantly reduces the chance that your bag will he mishandled," Mr Demael says, explaining that the use of baggage tracking data leads airlines to improvement rates of up to 66%.

"These improvements have resulted in baggage mishandling rates globally being cut in half over the past decade."

Despite the improvements, there is work still to do. A 2020 report from SITA found that in 2019, 25.4 million pieces of luggage were mishandled around the globe, costing the air transport industry approximately $2.5bn (£1.8bn; €2.1bn).

The global pandemic has been a disaster for the airline industry. But IATA, for its part, believes that the industry will return to 2019 levels in 2022, the same year that the industry is expected to return to breakeven or profitability.

And with that recovery will come the collection of record amounts of data.

The use of real-time data allows airports and airlines to allocate their resources more effectively, which means gates, checkout counters and baggage centres can be properly staffed, and unexpected events such as weather and flight cancellations can be dealt with promptly.

For passengers, Mr Demael says that data will be particularly valuable in a post-Covid environment.

Air Canada, uses a platform developed by New York-headquartered technology firm, Sisense, to collect and push various forms of data to staff members, from frontline employees to executives.

"Only by measuring can we improve, and now the measuring can be done closer to real time," says Shaul Shalev, Air Canada's Manager of Safety Analytics & Innovation.

Traditionally, data was shared by e-mail, alerts, PDFs and simple dashboards. Now, new technologies allow Air Canada to rapidly push information to employees through apps, smart watches and even immersive 3D environments to display the data.

"It is all about presenting the data to the right people, at the right time," Mr Shalev adds. "I cannot expect a user to stop his or her day job and go to an office, print out a PDF, look at a dashboard or the appropriate e-mail or bulletin to then digest the data they need."

Now, with a few mouse clicks the passenger can bring up all sorts of information on the state of the Air Canada fleet, which in the past would have taken days to assemble.

The next step, he says, is being able to identify problems long before they occur.

"Imagine if we can tell that a part on an aircraft needs to be replaced before its end of lifetime, or if we can predict failure of it and act accordingly," he says. "This exists now and is based on degraded performance over time - our approach will add more precision and thus allow us to select not only [what] to replace, but where and when."

At American Airlines, around 100 systems were consolidated into ten to make data in its cargo business much more manageable.

To date, the technology has impacted the work of more than 8,000 team members in both cargo and airport operations, as well as more than 30,000 customers.

"We're able to learn more from the level of data we receive based on customer behaviour, shipment performance and any issues we have that may be reoccurring," says Jessica Tyler, American Airlines' President Cargo and Vice President Operations Innovation and Delivery.

"In many cases we can see patterns and get ahead of the issues before it affects the shipment journey."

本文转载自：BBC www.bbc.com

原文作者：Bernd Debusmann Jr

原文地址：https://www.bbc.com/news/business-57232744

-