TECHLOG

Turkish Technic 's expansion in Asian markets 

(as published in Airport Cities)

Turkish Technic signed a support contract with Citilink, a domestic low cost carrier in Indonesia to supply component and repair on part basis for five years.  The support contract was signed by Citilink CEO Albert Burhan and Turkish Technic CEO Ahmet Karaman at an event in Dubai. As per the deal components will be supplied from Istanbul main base and Turkish Technic pooling stations in Middle East as well as at the low cost carrier’s Jakarta main base. Repair work of the components will be done at the Turkish Technic sites in Istanbul, Turkey.

With this new partnership Turkish Technic plans to expand its component sales and support service business to Far East, the company has already reached fleet size of more than 500 aircraft in the component pooling market.  According to Mr Karaman the company also aims at developing business with GMF Aero Asia as vendor to support the contract with Citilink and as component cum parts repairs service provider for other careers in the region.

“We thank Citilink for choosing Turkish Technic for their component support services. This is a bold step for us in 2015 and we keep broadening our component pooling in South East Asia,” he said.

In a quick chat with us during at the MRO Middle East event Mr Karaman discussed the about the deal and other developments. “For us as an MRO, incurring tangible profit from the five year support contract with Citilink will depend on hours of flying involved and how many aircrafts they fly etc. But we will be able to supply components for our clients in Asia locally.” The component availability locally through Turkish Technic will save cost and time for its clients in the Far East region. Mr Karaman says we as maintenance provider and Citilink will be sharing our capacities for mutual benefit and deal allows us to serve more than one airlines. We in Indonesia are offering one stop shop for components where mainly we have a one this one stop shop policy.

When asked about Turkish Technic’s performance last year Mr Karaman said that 2014 was year of growth, profits were made but more important expansions also took place. “We invested around USUSUS$550 million in development of new MRO facility at Sabiha Gocken International Airport in the new facility. We are four times bigger in terms of capacity compared to 2013. We are open at both Atatürk Airport and the new facility at Sabiha Gokcen Airport, one of the biggest airports the world.”

Speaking on the expansion plans in 2015 Mr Kraman said that Turkish Technic will continue efforts to expand in Middle East and EMEA at larger scale, whereas Far East also remains in focus too. “We have number of contracts in Europe and are planning expand our engine and landing gear services, especially in Europe, where we only provided component maintenance.” Turkish Technic is also focussing on growing its landing gear business in India.

When asked whether he looks OEM service contracts as challenge for growth Mr Karaman said that aircrafts will always need maintenance at some point of time. As you know MROs are like service stations that make sure aircrafts do not have any technical lapses. However, OEM service contracts present challenges in the engine service offerings. But major carriers usually sell or sublease their aircrafts to low cost airlines, who heavily depend on MROs for routine maintenance. “Apparently, we have a gap in component market which can be advantageous for building component pool.”

Mr Karaman concluded saying, “Being an MRO for the Turkish Airlines, over 70 per cent of our business is guaranteed as the airline flies around 260 aircrafts. We use our capacities to extend services to third party airlines Citilink and others to widen our reach.” Turkish Technic is the leading maintenance company providing technical services for airframe, engine, APU and components for a wide range of airlines from Europe, Middle East, Asia, CIS and Northern Africa. Citilink on te other hand, operates from Jakarta and two main hubs in Surubaya and Batam. It has a fleet of 33 Airbus A320s. Citilink provides scheduled domestic flights as well as international routes.

----------------------------------------------------

Airports become intelligent to serve better

From an integrated airport concept, airports across the world are now moving to an indulging airport concept; where the technologies like self service kiosks, e-bag tags and iBeacons help a passenger indulge to improve his experience. And the next generation airport architecture is increasingly focusing to highlight airport as a destination, than just a transit point.

Courtesy SITA

Airports are innovating technologies and services that make air travel as elegant, seamless, and efficient as possible. The boom in passenger numbers in the emerging markets like Middle East, Asia and Latin America has pushed the airport authorities and government to use airports as a status symbol trying to showcase wealth and richness of a state’s culture.

Companies and regulatory authorities like are coming up with technologies that enhance excellence. The things that impress passengers at arrivals now days is the grandeur of the terminal, and the relaxed posture of passengers waiting to board. The non aeronautical revenue has become critical for any Airport.

Technology is the biggest visible influence on the airport experience, and the mix of technology and architecture is only growing. Huge investments are made in to acquire different forms of screening technologies, smart security systems scanning you and your bag, instantaneous information using iBeacons and other near field technology telling you what is nearby and what you can do at the moment as you just walk by.

The efficiency in action is taken further with airside operations and safety being taken care with the latest and best technological solutions. 

Business Intelligence enhances planning of airport operations

Andrew O'Connor

SITA has been working towards enhancing passenger experience in aviation and the SITA Air Transport IT Summit 2014 discussed the smart airport concept with wearables, self service systems and Business Intelligence Data being the buzz. Andrew O'Connor Head of Airport Business at SITA in an exclusive interview discusses with us application of these technology and their benefits.

He says, all the products SITA has in airport line covers various operation portfolios like airport operational data bases, resource planning  and passenger management is one area and another area is the baggage processing products which are the things that we are known for like baggage reconciliation. There is also a bunch of new products, which are to do with the tracking packaged through the whole end to end journey.

SITA is very well for kiosks, there are kiosks called touch points.  This things smoothens the passenger flows through the airport, for eg. the self service gates going to last security, self service boarding gates, automated immigration systems, it makes whole end to end journey much more joined up with a bunch of solutions. "All this is possible through the data a passenger holds and passenger processing data makes automation possible for airports," O'Connor says.

"But what is trending is the Business intelligence; it is a big thing for us. We are seeing that all the different product portfolios we had are joining up and giving a combined view of what is happening going at the airport. And it also allows you to gain historical view; the airport can see what happened last week, last day or any given point of time, which in turn helps you to plan.  With live data you can also what is happening at present, so that you have situational awareness, which enables you to react to any disruption that occurs in a timely manner."

However according to O'Connor the most important of all the benefits that BI in operations provides, is the co-predictive element. By looking at the past and present trend in data the airport can know what the requirements of the future are.

Automation is one of the key players in reducing one's time at the airport. By automating processes you allow a passenger to drop a bag much more easily and head straight to the security to boarding the airport to the all these becomes faster and shorter time in the airport.

Speaking on the various trends in the airport technology O'Connor spoke on the opportunities provided by Biometrics, cloud data an automated security gates. 

O'Connor says that global passenger growth is everywhere, particularly in Middle East it’s happening very fast. At the same time passengers are becoming very demanding and it’s kind of a two competing trends. 

On the passenger side, with social media passengers can be very quick to complain about an airport or an airline or both. Coping with growing passenger numbers the pressure it puts on the airports and people's ability to complaint rapidly presents a challenge. One of the key discussions is that how to deal with the passenger growth while giving people a better service.  

So to serve those highly demanding passengers many new technologies are coming in the scene like the iBeacon technology launched by American airlines. With these technologies passengers allow themselves to be monitored, and you can put real benefit to people. 

Partnering with common use technologies like Google can help. We have discussed scenarios with Google in the past particularly to look at the mapping in airport. We do see that collaborating with Google on this can be beneficial for our customers and Google's ability to store huge data in cloud can be used by APIs. Plus it has the visibility for people who are actually travelling, O'Connor said.

Commenting on the on the future O'Connor said, "I see everything in the air transport integrated, and a passenger will be connected during the entire journey, he can be sharing communication with friends on the ground while onboard  using e-devices and buy a movie onboard to watch online." 

The biometric data will also play an important role once a passenger goes through a face scan his identity will be linked to his baggage too and all a person needs to do is walk through these sophisticated systems.