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If you were at an industry event and the discussion turned to digital transformation projects, would you stealthily slip away or stay? While digital topics might not make the top of a list of everyone’s favorite conversations, I recommend taking note of a couple of important points:
- The aviation industry’s investment in information technology (IT) projects has accelerated in the last few years and that trend should continue for good reasons—it’s driving efficiencies. However, Airbus says the biggest hurdle to the digital MRO ecosystem’s evolution is “the capacity of investment” by MRO providers around the world.
- Companies are moving at different paces on their digitalization journeys—some are seeking to adopt comprehensive modern maintenance and engineering platforms, some are trying to go paperless, and others are using predictive analytics to forward-position parts where needed. The digital transformation of each airline, MRO or supplier is an individual strategy based on requirements, priorities and available resources. In any case, it’s important to be advancing on the digital front now.
- Why? In addition to realizing potential efficiencies on many fronts, this trend can help the industry recover, grow and attract talent.
- Aircraft and engines already generate a lot of data—and that amount will only increase with each new generation. Is your company using that data effectively?
- Becoming digital means more than downloading a couple of apps. Organizational transformation is required to really implement a digital transformation. One doesn’t happen without the other.
- “Another key trend in the digital transformation is that for many customers, it is not only about buying a digital solution—but about collaborating to explore the opportunities of digital transformation in our industry,” says Philip Mende, Lufthansa Technik’s vice president of digital fleet services. See the collaboration examples in this article as well as the projects designed to link data sources together to streamline the management of technical issues related to MRO. Does your company want to collaborate or be left out?
- And lastly, “We see the gap between digital leaders and followers is starting to grow. With digitalization being the only game changer in this decade (before the introduction of new aircraft to reduce maintenance costs), it stands to reason that it will make a significant competitive difference a few years from now,” Mende says. Need I say more?
Need I say more?
