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COLUMN ESPEN OLSEN

reliability and asset uptime. The main Resource Shortages Hindering
benefit of this is allowing airlines to know Growth in Asia-Pac AR/VR Preparing the Worker of the
what they could do better in the future – if Airbus forecasts a need for over 33,000 Future
they know an asset may fail, they want to new aircraft globally by 2035, largely driven Experienced aircraft engineers are proving
know the most efficient way to reduce the by the rising demand in the Asia-Pacific. to be few and far between. It currently takes
failure rate while also achieving the most However, this rapid expansion has the up to 8 years for a maintenance worker to
effect accomplishment of any rectification potential to be hindered due to a lack of pass stringent training tests and become
actions. Prescriptive analytics can guide MRO capacity, lack of indigenous training fully licensed, time that the aviation
maintenance engineers, with sequences capabilities and lack of skilled workforce industry cannot wait for. Airlines and MRO
of tasks to execute in order to isolate the in the region. More passengers mean more operators in the APAC have avoided this
issue, when is the right time to do the repair planes needed to carry them - more planes by hiring in personnel from other countries,
and the correct tools to use, helping reduce mean more maintenance. but this is proving to be a significant cost
aircraft downtime. There are currently not enough fully- challenge.
Prescriptive maintenance will qualified, trained and certified maintenance Augmented reality is emerging to help
revolutionize MRO. IDC predicts that personnel to meet the needs of this growing bridge this gap - a cost- and time-friendly
50% of all business analytics software market. Boeing predicts that the aviation solution which provides expertise on
will incorporate prescriptive capabilities industry will need over 600,000 new demand from any location, no matter how
by 2020 In the future, it won’t be a bunch maintenance technicians globally in the next remote. Companies such as XMReality
of engineers telling you how and when to 20 years as current personnel retire, with have developed a telepresence and data
repair an asset because the asset itself much of this demand coming from Asia-Pac. transmission solution that connects
will tell you what it needs and how it needs Meeting this demand and matching onsite operators with a technical expert
it. The technology is still in the early stages the requirements of the next generation of anywhere in the world, in real-time, giving
of adoption in civil aviation, but watch this maintenance workers will take innovative maintenance workers in remote locations
space as the technology starts to mature in solutions, including new technologies and access to a virtual pair of expert eyes and
2017. training methods. hands to guide them through complex tasks.
I expect we will see a sharp increase in
adoption in APAC as the technology fully
matures to plug this resource shortage gap.
Riding the Technology Wave
New technologies and the digitization
of services are creating big benefits for
airline and MRO operators to streamline
maintenance, reduce operating costs and
take full advantage of the skyrocketing
air travel demand. Early adopters of these
three trends will see operations completely
transformed. Watch out for these
technologies coming to MRO near you in 2017.
(Espen Olsen, Business Development
and Sales for Aerospace & Defense at IFS).

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