Real-Time Flight Tracking at Azul Linhas Aéreas - SITA
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CASE STUDY: AZUL LINHAS AÉREAS
Real-Time Flight Tracking
at Azul Linhas Aéreas
Felipe Starling, IT Manager Flight Ops Solution, Azul Linhas Aéreas
outlines a 100% global, real-time aircraft flight tracking project
AIRCRAFT IT Operations • SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER 2018 • 26
CASE STUDY: AZUL LINHAS AÉREAS
W
hile this article is ultimately about flight tracking, an important and
pertinent topic today, readers will need a context in which to put
the flight tracking information. So, perhaps the first thing I should
do is to explain something about the airline that is the subject of
this article.
AZUL LINHAS AÉREAS
Azul at a Glance
We believe we are the fastest-growing, most profitable and best positioned airline in Brazil
2008 2012 2014 2015 2016 2017
Maiden Acquisition of Next-Gen Partnership with United Partnership with HNA Azul IPO (US and Brazil)
Flight TRIP Airlines Aircrafts US$ 100M investment US$ 450M investment NYSE: AZUL
15 Dec 64 destinations 63 A320neo for a 5% economic stake for 24% economic stake B3: AZUL4
VCP-SSA 33 ERJ-E2 in Azul in Azul Orlando
Lisbon
Ft. Lauderdale/Miami
Cayenne
Boa Vista
• #1 in destinations served (over 100) Macapá
Belém
Manaus Santarém
São Luís Parnaíba
Tabatinga Parintins Altamira Jericoacoara
Tefé
Fortaleza
Teresina Fernando
• #1 on 71% of routes served Marabá
Carajás
Imperatriz
Natal
de Noronha
Juazeiro do Norte João Pessoa
Porto Velho Campina Grande
Alta Floresta Petrolina Recife
Palmas
Ji-Paraná Sinop Paulo Afonso Maceió
Sorriso
• #1 in departures (~one third of departures
Cacoal
Vilhena Barreiras Aracaju
Lençóis Fiero de Santana
in the country)
Salvador
Cuiabá Barra do Valença
Garças Brasília
Positive Fundamentals Driving the Brazilian Aviation Market
Vitória da Conquista Ilhéus
Rondonópolis Goiânia Montes Claros
Rio Verde
Caldas Novas Governador Porto Seguro
Corumbá Valadares Teixeira de Freitas
Uberlândia Araxá
Uberaba Divinópolis Ipatinga
Campo Grande
• #1 in on-time performance in Brazil 2017 (OAG) S. J. do Rio Preto Belo Horizonte (Confins )
Growth in the Brazilian middle class supported by rising per capita income, leading to more
Três Lagoas
Bonito Araçatuba Varginha
Presidente Prudente Ribeirão Preto Vitória
Zona da Mata
Dourados Marília Campinas Campos dos Goytacazes
Londrina
passengers and flights per capita in Brazil
Bauru Cabo Frio
Maringá Rio de Janeiro
São Paulo São Paulo
Cascavel (Congonhas )
(Guaruhos ) (Santos Dumont / Galeão)
Foz do Iguaçu Ponta Grossa Curitiba
Lages
Chapecó Joinville
Navegantes
• #1 in customer satisfaction
Passo Fundo
Brazil Domestic Passengers by Year
Santo Angelo Florianópolis
Uruguaiana Caxias do Sul
Domestic Flights Per Capita
Jaguaruna
Santa Maria
Porto Alegre
Pelotas (in millions)
Hub
New destination
Source: Azul, Innovata, OAG and Melhores Destinos Punta Del Este New international routes (announced)
Córdoba Montevidéu
Buenos Aires
Rosario
Bariloche
131
FIGURE 1 Azul represents 50% 2,2
From commencing operations in 2008 (figure 1)and now ten years old, Azul has of pax growth since
2007
grown organically and by acquisition. In 2012 Azul acquired Trip Airlines which
89
was, at the time, the largest South American airline in terms of number of
21
destinations. 2013 saw Azul starting a program to introduce Next-Gen aircraft 1,1
across the fleet with orders placed for 63 Airbus A320neos and 33 Embraer 47
ERJ-E2 second generation. Partnerships were established in 2015 and 2016 with 68 0,5
0,6
0,5
United Airlines in the USA and HNA in China. 2017 saw the airline’s IPO being 0,3
listed on both the New York Stock Exchange as well as in Brazil. As things stand
today, Azul serves more than 100 destinations and is the number one operator 2007 2016 2021E Brazil Brazil Chile Colombia US US 2015
2007 2015 2015 2015 1960´s
on 71% of the routes it serves as well as being number one in departures with
one third of departures in Brazil. Azul is also number one in Brazil for on-time Source: Azul, IATA, CEBR, ABEAR and IBGE
performance and number one for customer satisfaction. FIGURE 2
Looking more widely at the Brazilian aviation market (figure 2), in the period That’s all against a background of the number of domestic flights per capita in
2007 to 2016, the market doubled with Azul being responsible for half of that Brazil being pretty low compared to a comparable South American market such
growth. as Colombia or a mature market such as the USA. The inference is that there is a
AIRCRAFT IT Operations • SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER 2018 • 27
CASE STUDY: AZUL LINHAS AÉREAS
great deal of opportunity to expand and exploit that market. That said,, Azul Out of the 98 cities that Azul serves in Brazil, 61 have populations in excess of 1
already has a presence in a lot of cities in Brazil (figure 3 — places marked in blue). million people and, also of the cities Azul serves, the airline is number one in 68
Market and Route Leadership of them. All that is achieved with a fleet of mixed aircraft types. Azul operates 34
Azul is strongly positioned in Brazil, with strong presence in underserved markets… ATRs, 70 Embraer E-Jets and 8 A320neos which will rise to 35 by 2020 as
Most Relevant Airline by City Azul Route Position
aircraft on order, see above, are delivered. These are appropriately sized aircraft
(September 2017) (Domestic, September 2017) for the Brazilian market and fit well with Azul’s process of opening a market with
Domestic Population
an ATR service, then developing that market to the point where it will warrant
Cities
Cities
Served
Where #1*
in #1 Cities
(million) the use of the larger E-RJ aircraft and, hopefully, eventually, the A320neo. There
are also some small cities in Brazil, a huge country, that will only ever in the
98 foreseeable future justify the ATR aircraft. So, as you can see, the size of aircraft
is really important in this market. Also, the ATRs are usually used on routes with
68 an average stage length of under 500km while the E-Jets average stage length
61
52 is nearer 800km while the A320neo fleet serves routes with an average stage
44
41 length of nearly 1,500km.
The next generation aircraft have some financial advantage over the Embraer
14
10 e-95 that is currently in the fleet and Azul expects the CASK (Cost per Available
5
Seat Kilometer) to reduce as the next generation aircraft enter service. In fact, we
Azul Gol TAM Azul Gol TAM Azul Gol TAM
• Strong penetration in underserved markets already have achieved a 29% CASK reduction using the A320neo. What that means
• Hubs located in Campinas (VCP) and Belo Horizonte
(CNF), two of the largest airports and metropolitan areas in is that all the 56 seats colored yellow in the seating plan in figure 4 overleaf, and
the country Azul Gol LATAM
additional to the seating available on the E-RJ are, literally, at no extra cost.
Source: Azul, ANAC and Companies
* Considers leadership by number of departures. Excludes cities in which one carrier has less than a 5% advantage
Also, because Azul has a strong position in Brazil and significant market
FIGURE 3 penetration, there are 31 cities that Azul serves with international connections, two
AIRCRAFT IT Operations • SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER 2018 • 28
CASE STUDY: AZUL LINHAS AÉREAS
“…a lot of work has been invested by ICAO (International Civil Aviation Organization) to generate a Global Aeronautical
Distress & Safety System (GADSS) with ‘Aircraft Tracking’, ICAO Annex 6.”
Next Gen Aircraft: Key Driver of Margin Expansion Superior Service
Replacing older generation aircraft with new generation aircraft to further strengthen Azul’s margins going Azul was recognized as the third best airline in the world by TripAdvisor in 2017, has
forward attained high customer satisfaction and wide recognition by industry specialists
Domestic Product & Service Awards
E2 and A320Neo CASK Advantage Next Generation Aircraft Expected
Percentage of Total ASKs
47%
Best Low-Cost Carrier Best Airline in Brazil Best Loyalty Program in Most On-Time LCC
6% • New, modern aircraft in the World
E2 38% in South America Brazil
-24.0% 3% • Generous onboard service
-29.0% A320neo
27% • Live TV
41% • Premium legroom (30-inch pitch
14% 35% or more vs. 29 inches) Fastest Check-in in Best Staff in South America’s most
Best on-time airline
Brazil Leadership
rship South
• Extra legroom with 34-inch pitch America
• Motivated and empowered
crewmembers
E195 E2 A320neo 2017 2018 2019 2020
118 seats 132 seats 174 seats
• Customer-centric culture 3rd Best Airline in the
World
Net Promoter Score*
A320neo Seat Map
64 63
D E F
Performance Indicators
WC
WC
A B C
Most On-time LCC in Third Most On-time
WC
WC
A320neo
90% of customers would recommend or strongly recommend the World (A15) Airline in the World (A15)
01
02
03
04
05
06
07
08
09
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
Azul to a friend or relative
Low-Cost Low-Cost
Exit
Rank OTP Rank OTP
Exit
Exit
Exit
Carrier Carrier
Source: Brazil’s Ministry of Transportation, Ports and Civil Aviation, Azul customer
• A320neo provides 56 additional seats at virtually no additional cost per flight compared to previous aircraft used in surveys, NPSbenchmarks.com, OAG (2015)
* Net Promoter Score (NPS) is a management tool used to gauge the loyalty of a
1st Azul 91.0% 3rd Azul 91.0%
long-haul missions, significantly reducing cost per seat firm’s customer relationships
FIGURE 4
and a half times as many as our nearest competitor, made possible also by Azul’s FIGURE 5
partnerships with other airlines in the US, Europe and China. Everything that Azul does is based around the business’s core values:
Although predominantly a low-cost airline, Azul operates modern aircraft with • Safety — respect life under all circumstances;
generous services and better than average features and facilities such as legroom • Consideration — treat everyone as we would wish to be treated;
which we believe to be one of the reasons why we have been growing so fast (the • Integrity — honor our word and act ethically;
A330s used on Azul’s international services have facilities such as the sky sofa) and • Passion — be passionate about what we do to serve people;
which have been recognized with a number of independent awards (figure 5). • Innovation — in everything we do and pursue, innovate to be better;
• Excellence — do the best to achieve exceptional results.
That first core value, safety, has driven the key subject of this article, flight
“……aircraft operators have a responsibility for aircraft tracking.
tracking and to maintain a ground-based record of the
FLIGHT TRACKING: ICAO AND GADSS
four dimensional (4D) position of an individual aircraft in Following a number of well-publicized incidents where not knowing an aircraft’s
flight, the 4D position report including time, latitude, location was a key consideration, a lot of work has been invested by ICAO
(International Civil Aviation Organization) to generate a Global Aeronautical
longitude and altitude.” Distress & Safety System (GADSS) with ‘Aircraft Tracking’, ICAO Annex 6. This
has established that aircraft operators have a responsibility for aircraft tracking
AIRCRAFT IT Operations • SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER 2018 • 29
CASE STUDY: AZUL LINHAS AÉREAS
for tracking their own flights. The challenge that we
face in Brazil is that there is not full coverage across the
country for VHF at flight level FL180 but, for the
Embraer, Airbus A320 and wide-body A330 there is
full coverage across the continent because their flight
level is above FL200. However, it is necessary to solve
this problem and the solution at which we arrived was
to implement FlightTracker from SITAONAIR. Not only
does it fulfil the requirements of ICAO GADSS but also
it does not require any significant re-engineering of the
aircraft. Let me explain.
FLIGHTTRACKER: SPACE-BASED
ADS-B
FlightTracker is a space-based ADS-B (Automatic
Dependent Surveillance — Broadcast) solution
powered by Aireon. Azul does not need to put
anything in the aircraft but will enjoy the benefit of
global coverage, including those areas where there
are gaps in VHF coverage (see above) as well as
coverage for Oceanic areas. How it will work is that
the space-based ADS-B will be added to
FlightTracker and aircraft positions will be identified
as such within the application. Importantly, no
changes are needed to the aircraft in order to use
the application which is very valuable because if, say,
we had to install some satellite communication
technology, that would require that the aircraft be
taken out of service or a maintenance event be
extended which would mean significant cost
and to maintain a ground-based record of the four January 2021, autonomous distress tracking will be implications to do that.
dimensional (4D) position of an individual aircraft in introduced and that report generation will need to be Data about the aircraft’s position is passed to
flight, the 4D position report including time, latitude, every minute. Fortunately, the system that Azul Linhas FlightTracker using the existing web service from
longitude and altitude. The aim of this ICAO Aéreas has adopted for this purpose, FlightTracker FlightAware and all existing FlightTracker alerting
standard is to reduce the potential search and rescue from SITAONAIR, is already capable of supporting the functions are available against this data. That means
area in the event of an incident, to 6NM (nautical ground based component. Space Based ADS-B is a that alerts can be set up with changes of rules or
miles) radius. key component for the provision of 4D position anything that the airline needs. Importantly, this all
The target dates for implementation of these reports every 1 minute supporting the distress tracking allows the airline to meet GADSS without increasing
standards for aircraft tracking are that by 8th standard required by ICAO. the costs of ACARS/SATCOM messaging purely for
November 2018 (later this year) airlines should have in So, looking at Azul’s progress in this matter, in 2015 position reporting. Also, Azul does not need to have
place, for aircraft in the air, a system that will generate there was one person per shift who was responsible for an Iridium contract because everything is undertaken
a 4D position report every 15 minutes. Thereafter, by flight tracking. Today, every dispatcher is responsible by and handled through SITAONAIR.
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FlightTracker currently uses a combination of position sources to maximize
coverage, including: Terrestrial ADS-B; Various FANS (Future Air Navigation
Systems) based communications, ADS-C (Automatic Dependent Surveillance
— Contract), CPDLC (Controller-Pilot Data Link Communication) and AFN
(Aeronautical Facilities Notification); ACARS; and Radar.
As already mentioned and importantly, the system is specifically designed to
provide aircraft tracking using existing on-board equipment which matters in “…the system is specifically designed to provide aircraft
terms of cost for the solution. The Alert Module in FlightTracker continually tracking using existing on-board equipment which
tracks each flight automatically and generates a warning when an aircraft
triggers certain defined conditions. Alerts can be set up to suit the airline’s needs matters in terms of cost…”
and to trigger various actions, including uplinks to the aircraft; also messaging
actions can escalate as the severity of the condition changes and, in more critical
cases, FlightTracker can automatically set up an ADS-C contract for FANS FELIPE STARLING
equipped aircraft to provide an additional 1 minute position reporting option for Felipe is the Business Solution Manager at Azul responsible for
the remainder of the flight. developments and implementations on existing and new systems, including
Flight Operations, OCC (Operations Control Center), Crew App, Safety,
HOW THE FUTURE WILL LOOK Employees Training, Crew Planning and Optimization, Statistics, Customer
In figure 6 you can see what we expect for the future when there is full global Experience, etc. Previously, as Statistics and Business Intelligence Manager,
coverage with satellites. he developed online multi-channel dashboards with KPIs and was
responsible for Call Center workforce sizing, automated dialer strategy and sales
commission modelling.
Space Based ADS-B
Initial satellites are already Constellation will comprise AZUL LINHAS AÉREAS
in service with remaining 66 satellites with 9 in flight Azul Linhas Aéreas Brasileiras S/A is a Brazilian carrier
deployment over the spares and additional based in São Paulo. The company’s business model is to
coming months ground spares stimulate demand by providing frequent and affordable air
service to underserved markets throughout Brazil. Azul
serves 108 destinations in Argentina, Brazil, French Guiana, Portugal, the United States,
and Uruguay plus some other locations by means of dedicated executive bus services to
the nearest airport
SITAONAIR
SITAONAIR is the air travel industry’s trusted
connected aircraft service expert, helping airlines
around the world realize the full potential of nose-to-
tail connectivity. Whether personalizing the passenger experience, streamlining cabin and
cockpit operations, or optimizing maintenance procedures, SITAONAIR solutions enable
Provides 100% Global cover including airlines to navigate the complexity of connectivity and unlock connected aircraft value.
Polar, Oceanic and other remote areas
16 INTERACTIVE GIVE US YOUR OPINION
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FIGURE 6
The satellites are not yet fully deployed but will be by the end of the year to INTERACTIVE SUBSCRIBE HERE
meet ICAO requirements and to deliver the full FlightTracker solution. CLICK HERE TO READ ALL FUTURE EDITIONS
AIRCRAFT IT Operations • SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER 2018 • 32You can also read
