The Future of Passenger Experience
Tony Hall has been a highly esteemed and sought-after Associate since the inception of Platform Smart back in 2015. He started his first Platform Smart engagement in a Leading UK Airport back in 2017 following a stint at a Leading UK Ferry & Logistics company. Interestingly, I remember writing the underpinning Work Package which was also our first formal SoW into the account for PAX and Biometrics Services, since then Tony has worked on and off the account for the last 8 or so years, covering Passenger Experience, Xovis, Security and much, much more.
I’ve known Tony for just over 10 years now and have always favoured his insights and opinion on technology, a particular highlight for me was our weekly technology governance sessions. In this interview, I catch up with Tony and ask him a number of questions about the aviation industry, frictionless travel and more…
Words by Stephen Cox
Stephen: Frictionless travel. Tell me a bit about what that actually means, how long is it before we see passport-less travel? Why is my passport not on my phone? What are the key technologies that can allow it to happen and what does it actually look like?
Tony: Yes, Passportless travel. It does have a number of challenges at this point, most of them aren't technical though, there are several technologies that would facilitate it and they're already mature.
Specifically, around biometric technologies, digital identity is a key driver for many of these, but industry standards need to be adopted for it to work at all levels. An open standard called ‘decentralized identity’ or ‘self-sovereign identity’ for example is a good framework to allow the use of trusted identity through a passenger journey. Being an open standard, it’s currently being pushed by a lot of companies that are in this space.
There's an organizational body called DIF (Decentralized Identity Foundation) which chairs working groups, etc. for that standard. The idea of a decentralized identity is to put the control of the identity back into the hands of the owner of that identity, in this model, individuals (passengers in the case of aviation) can manage their own identity data. This means you only share information that's relevant to your particular part of the journey. You don't have to, for example, share your date of birth if you're buying something from WHSmith to prove that you're traveling. You don't need to show them your whole passport as you do today. If you think about it, it's actually more secure in that respect, whereby you only have to provide a relevant piece of identity data that you own for the particular checkpoint or transaction that you're making. Decentralized identity is the enabler for digital identity in these contexts, in terms of aviation and airports specifically, it also requires biometrics at borders to provide that frictionless travel experience.
There are quite a few types of country and area-based regulation standards already in place to facilitate it (biometrics) or are being worked on. In the EU for example, there is something called the European Travel Information and Authorization System (ETIAS) and the Entry/Exit System (EES). Some people might be familiar with EES, which the EU has implemented at a few locations, this is a standards based system that's driven by the governing body, the EU. Airports can sign up for that and use that as a standard or with a technology partner, etc. But in terms of digital passports, that's obviously an enabler for biometric travel, which is key. You need to have facial recognition and biometrics capabilities at the border. But also, in terms of digital passports, there's something called a digital travel credential which is an International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) initiative and standard.
Again, an international standard. I think that's being trialled at various hubs, not just airports, it can be used at various transport hubs like Eurostar, for example. I think that's something from a passport-less travel is ultimately ready and mature,, if you think about your passports today, they are already digital to some degree. So, they're already machine readable in part. You already have a chip inside them with biometric data on them. They're kind of a hybrid digital and physical identity. What digital travel credentials will do is digitize it completely. And that's when you'll have it on your phone.
To make travel truly frictionless, it's no good if you still have to present your phone rather than a piece of paper. Some people say it's easier to produce a piece of paper actually. The idea of frictionless travel is that you don't have to keep producing an identity verification at the various touch points, whether that's a digital one or a paper-based one. What you want to enable, is the ability to just walk through an airport where your face is your passport, and that's where facial recognition is critical and key.
A lot of people don't realize that that's already implemented at a lot of airports. It's implemented at Heathrow, for example, for domestic passengers. You can board digitally. You've got biometrics at ticket presentation when you first come into the airport and then when you go to your gate to board.
So that's already there today. That technology is there. It's the identity bit which isn’t. Obviously, an airport doesn't own the information in terms of identity, which ultimately is a government-owned document. So, the passport itself is still paper-based and until you get a digital identity strategy, it's difficult to go fully digital. It has to start at government agencies. Your identity would be digital from that point forward. Then you can use it for any touch point. It doesn't have to be an airport. It could be any transport hub, it could be purchasing goods/services, it could be for anything where you'd need to produce an identity. We’ve already got international standards there, the technology is already there, but actually, governments haven't done their bit because it's a big piece of work, if you think about it just in this country alone, to completely replace the whole framework to move from paper-based identity, which is essentially managed by the UK home office, etc. andthe UK passport is all a paper-based system and ultimately links back to your birth certificate. To digitize all of that is a big piece of work.
There are countries in the EU, some of the Eastern Bloc countries that came out of the Soviet era that went to digital straight away. Estonia would be a good example of that. They've got big advantages to having a completely digital economy whereby all their identities are digital from the moment they're born they have a digital identity.
Stephen: Let's talk about IOT (Internet of Things) and OT (Operational Technologies), for someone like me, what is it and what does it mean in terms of passengers, and airports? What's the use case for it?
Tony: Airports are quite a unique kind of workplace because they have a mix of IT and OT whereby you can have those two independent technologies side by side, you have information technology, your standard office environment like in a bank for example. And an OT which could be a factory-based environment, someone like an Amazon of the world or someone that manufactures components for cars would be primarily OT-based, with minimal IT, but their focus would be OT. An airport is almost split between that, with a leaning towards more OT because you do have large and complex baggage systems. It's like a little mini city effectively where traditionally you've had that separation between IT and OT, where thats effectively a split betweenairside and landside locations in the airport.
‘Never the twain shall meet.’ But now we're in a world where from a digital transformation perspective, the whole airport needs to come along that digital transformation journey. That includes OT, but it is fundamentally different from IT, and it should be treated as such. It's not the same thing.
There are benefits to modernizing those parts of the airport. So, the OT, baggage is the prime example that everyone can think of, but it's not just related to baggage, there are other technologies in OT land. So technologies around aircraft parking, docking, etc. Servicing those data signals from those parts of the business from OT can produce data insights where you previously didn't have them. And that can help to improve things like baggage management, for example.
Stephen: How is the design of terminals changing and how's that affecting passengers? Where do you see that going in the future? I don't know how long you've been working in airports, but I know full well that it is a number of years…
Tony: Oh, it's near 20 years now.
Stephen: You've therefore likely seen the development of firstly Heathrow Terminal 5 and then the newer Terminal 2. I imagine there was a whole bunch of learning between each. What do you think is next in terms of terminals and making it efficient for passengers, but not just efficient but a great experience from the moment they get out of the car to the moment they get on the plane?
Tony: So that whole curb to gate’ experience is what the digital transformation & digital identity looks to improve. It's just one of those things that actually if you ask passengers what they're most frustrated about when they get to an airport, it's going through security and the anxiety of it. Improving the security, the security lanes specifically and that process, whilst you can't make that completely frictionless, because you've still got to do physical security chekcs, you can make it easier with things like CT scanners for example. They're implementing that now and that will definitely allow an improved experience, it was supposed to happen I think this month to increase the maximum limit allowance on liquids. Part of that is dependent on the CT implementation, but it's a very complex and sensitive technology.
Self-service bag drop is another key service that's happened, automating that. If you're a frequent flyer, you'll absolutely love self-service backdrop. Sometimes if you're just on holiday, you've got a family with you prefer the traditional check-in process. So, providing a blend of both, I think it's not one or the other, I think providing a blend of those options, depending on the type of traveller you are.
You can just have passengers that don't even go to self-service bagdrop, and want to go straight through to security, with hand luggage only for example. If you can provide them a complete digital experience whereby their faces are their passport effectively, they'll understand your security, and get through security. But if you can improve that process before security and boarding, that is a major win. I think a lot of airports are doing that at the moment. I think there are a number of programs, American ones specifically, Customs and Border Protection (CBP) are doing that for American citizens by using preclearance capability to reduce the friction for American citizens flying into the US for example. There's an initiative at Gatwick looking at that, I think also. A lot of it ultimately does go back to digital transformation and digital identity and the technologies associated with that.
The terminal design and layouts. I mean, you just look at T5 as a great example. I think it should be open, airy, and light. I think that in itself improves the perception and experience of passengers and then obviously the security, once they get through security it just makes things easier.
Stephen: Why does it always seem to take an eternity to board the plane?
Tony: Well, we could start touching on AI if you want, because it all has to do with turnaround, the way it’s managed and maintained within an airport and specifically airlines to improve turnaround times is a key driver.
Turnaround isn't just parking an aircraft. It's cleaning it, it's loading baggage, etc. That whole process has a set time, aside from those factors you've got the amount of time it takes for an aircraft to land taxi and then get to the gate. That itself is quite a complex planning exercise as you can imagine. You only have to do one thing, especially when you've got an airport like Heathrow for example, where it runs at maximum capacity during summer peak most of the time, it doesn't take much to interrupt and change, whether that's a fault on an aircraft, whether that's a fault at the gate, any number of things, you name it.
It has knock-on effects and that's where the delays come into it, and you have to start making those on-the-fly changes to your schedules. It's quite a difficult thing to do. This is where AI can actually come in and help because it can model various scenarios on the fly much more effectively than humans can. It just speeds the process up. That's often why and sometimes you'll get a late gate change as well. It is something that annoys me, you've got to run to another gate. Well, if you had, again going back to the OT technology where you can surface those signals where that data, the reason that there's a gate change can be surfaced back to the passenger on their phone. They can get that information much sooner rather than having to wait for it to come through the system then coming up on the information display inside the airport.
You therefore don't have to run because you've got it much earlier. That type of improvement isn't necessarily obvious, but it actually does provide a benefit to passengers in periods of disruption when it's most acute. When everything's running smooth things work fine most of the time. It's when there's a disruption or an impact to a particular flight schedule or aircraft that it causes knock-on effects.
Stephen: We've obviously talked about biometrics there and ID and then AI, the buzzword of the moment. Outside of those number of things, where do you see it going for the industry?
Tony: Aviation technology tends to move slower than most, purely because it's aviation. So safety is paramount, you have to prove technologies before they're implemented and safety in terms of security, not just physical safety. It's very paramount. They tend to move a bit slower than certainly other sectors in technology. You therefore tend not to have the kind of ‘move fast and break things’ attitude that Silicon Valley has. At least I don't see it in terms of transformation. I think digital transformation is where you're going to see the biggest change. I think in 10 or 15 years almost anything can happen. But yes, I think that's definitely where you're going to see the most change. I think you are going to start seeing maybe even autonomous vehicles as well airside more. That seems to be a really good use case for autonomous vehicles because you can stipulate the specific movements of them, much less chaos involved in that than there is in a traditional city environment.
I think you're going to start seeing more battery technologies on those air side vehicles also, it’s something that a lot of people don't think of. Also, actually the move, non-ironically, to the cloud for airport operational databases which is a traditional on-prem component.
Stephen: This is going to seem like a noddy question to what you've just spoken about, why are there so many WH Smiths Airside?
Tony: I guess it's because it's a one stop, isn't it? I think that you can go in there and it's certainly for domestic passengers, it's familiar, it is for me. I know WH Smith, I know I can walk in there, I know what I get. So I think it's the fact that you can get everything in there. It's a one stop shop. It provides reading material as well, which is quite unique. If you go to other airports, I know it's to try and find papers, magazines and stuff, physical magazines to read on a plane is quite difficult. It's quite unique to the UK.
Stephen: Would you bring back the Concorde?
Tony: Not the Concorde as it was, but a supersonic jet? We need one for sure. Until Elon Musk provides a passenger space flight where we can effectively go up to orbit, sit there, wait for the country to come around and go down, then yeah we've got I think a supersonic passenger aircraft. Absolutely. Yeah. Why not?
Stephen: And then finally and I guess this is more Platform Smart related. Is there any sort of interview that you would like to see? Who should we get in touch with? What do you want to know about?
Tony: I'd be interested in anything outside of the traditional areas where platforms might be working, outside of aviation and airport. I think there are some newer clients which have come on board, in the automotive sector I think that'd be quite interesting. In addition to QinetiQ, I'd be interested to tie up with anyone who works at QinetiQ as well because there is a link there obviously with security. That would be a good one.
TONY HALL
Platform Smart Associate & Technical Architect
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