Digitalising the aircraft cabin has long been discussed as one of the key benefits of the digital agenda, and particularly the Internet of Things. But what are the challenges, tensions and opportunities? Join us for the latest in our ab initio primer guides!
The digital cabin is one of those terms often bandied about but rarely defined, comprising a variety of elements from the Internet of Things sensors in elements like seats, galleys and catering trolleys, through to passenger entertainment, plus inflight connectivity, crew tablets, integrated digital operations and much more.
With AERQ — the joint venture between German MRO and technology provider Lufthansa Technik and Korean electronics powerhouse LG — taking the Aircraft Interiors Expo by storm, and its products demonstrated on multiple partner companies’ booths including seatmaker Recaro and Airbus subsidiary Stelia Aerospace, we sat down with co-managing director Arnd Kikker, to talk about the digital cabin.
At present, Kikker tells us, from the passenger point of view “things in the aircraft cabin are far away from what you normally experience on ground with regard to integration of your PED, the intuitiveness of using the system, the smart coupling of TVs and the system on board, and the way the whole thing is basically seen and managed.”
From the airline and operational perspective, meanwhile, “the digital cabin is even more far away than what you experience as of today, because the systems which are in place and the availability and the infrastructure of solutions in the cabin — in order to really push for digital cabin — are barely existent, or they are very rigid and closed elements,” Kikker says.
To an extent, this closed nature is part of certification requirements, where the passenger environment and aircraft operational environment must be walled off from each other in order to avoid any suggestion that a passenger might be able to hack into the aircraft from, say, the inflight entertainment system.
Keeping flight-critical systems separate is crucial, but complicates matters
A key gap in the present digital cabin ecosystem is agreed and defined differentiation between key flight-critical operational systems and other systems, particularly around connectivity.
In essence: which elements have to leave the aircraft live, and which can be batched to be sent either on the ground via a cellular mobile connection, or even sneakernetted off the aircraft? Which of the live elements can only be transmitted via the most secure kinds of operational-only connection, and which elements can do so over other faster and less expensive connections, such as those shared with passengers for their own Internet use, perhaps with the use of a VPN?
All that must be taken into account when considering the twin goals that airlines have for the digital cabin. “One is the savings side and the ability to make use of the gains of data out of the engagement in order to push services which then ultimately generate value,” Kikker says, and the other, “from the passenger perspective, it’s more the experience what they have on grounds with the devices you have at hand.”
For that first goal, Kikker says, “digitalisation should drive efficiency and savings through enhanced and digitalised processes, be it for deployment of content to the aircraft, be it for how to test and scale things and how to manage the system — this is pretty hands on as of today as well.”
For the second goal: “what can we do with the data generated inside the cabin, outside of it in our system?” Kikker asks. “Do we have personalised services and solutions in order to embrace the relevance for the individual in order to push the engagement of the individual?”
The debate over closed vs open architectures, and who owns those architectures, continues
Fundamentally, there is an inherent tension between the closed systems driven by the regulatory requirements of the aircraft environment and the open systems that are a hallmark of modern technology development. This has been something of a stumbling block for innovators outside the aviation industry, and has often created barriers to entry.
“We believe that an open software architecture will allow, basically, the digitalisation of the cabin by giving airlines the control choice and competition, meaning that airlines really can control what’s going on in their cabin with regard to digital solutions,” Kikker says. “Airlines will be able to test and scale and to try out different applications as quick as they can on dedicated flights, on dedicated routes, dedicated fleets and for dedicated passenger groups. And this is not available as of today. And this is one of the core things we think the digitalised cabin has to have: it has to have the background and infrastructure in place.”
A concomitant tension is around which part of the aircraft value chain is the owner and operator of that architecture, which is the data manager, and which entities can process what data and how. To date, the industry has used a plethora of different models.
The owner-operator might be separate organisations or one single organisation. It might be the airline itself, though there is a certain scale requirement for this to be an efficient use of staff, time, and money, so this model would be most likely for a larger carrier or airline group.
The owner-operator might be the airframer, as with Airbus’ Airspace Link. It might be an integrator, whether a large tier-1 aviation conglomerate with an integrator business unit (the Safrans and Raytheons of this world) or one of the comparatively smaller, specialist integrators (a Lufthansa Systems or AERQ, say), or a consultancy outfit (from the Big 4 down to one-person shops) . It might even be an inflight entertainment system provider (a Panasonic or a Thales).
The data manager might be any one of those, and inherently the ability to select which entity can process data, what data is released for processing, and what restrictions there are on that data, will determine how other entities — including innovators, suppliers, service providers and others — can be involved in the process.
Kikker sums up the challenge facing all the players thus: “one is the technology aspect to it, and then the other ones are like contractual hurdles… they have certain requirements from contract side, which are not easy to basically agree upon. And then there are technical elements where the technical side of things can be normally resolved by technical solutions, so that you get together and agree on the approach.”
Author: John Walton
Published 11th October 2022
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