Digitalization and Industry 4.0 in the Aviation Industry (first abstract of a publication to be presented in early 2017)

The digital revolution in this industry really begins from the end customer’s perspective!
For years, the introduction and growth of platforms to be used by end customers/passengers has been based on transparency about cost, routes, global alternatives, and required travel time. This was a prerequisite and starting point to increase the growth rate of low cost carriers and for questioning the traditional business model of legacy airlines. The revolution is over in that segment; new business models will come, but we find ourselves in a post-revolution era…

Things look dif­fe­rent in aero­space pro­duc­tion, whe­re we real­ly have to won­der when this indus­try will even pass the 3^rd indus­tri­al revo­lu­ti­on. Other than a few select examp­les, the air­craft pro­duc­tion is less auto­ma­ted than most other indus­tries. Final assem­bly lines are domi­na­ted by manu­al work, and so are main are­as of parts pro­duc­tion and sub-assem­blies.
The upco­m­ing intro­duc­tion of robots at Air­bus and Boe­ing makes sen­se, with mon­th­ly pro­duc­tion rates for some air­craft above 50 units. But we still have a long way to go befo­re we see the first ful­ly auto­ma­ted air­frame pro­du­ced.

Howe­ver, the­re are good oppor­tu­nities to take ide­as and learnings from Indus­try 4.0 and use them in air­craft pro­duc­tion. In par­ti­cu­lar, the use of tools for custo­mer-spe­ci­fic opti­ons could be redu­ced by soft­ware-dri­ven solu­ti­ons and intel­li­gent imple­men­ta­ti­on of laser poin­ting mecha­nisms. Alt­hough 3 D prin­ting offers huge poten­ti­als to pro­vi­de more custo­mer-spe­ci­fic solu­ti­ons by mana­ging the­se opti­ons and the com­ple­xi­ty by app­ly­ing Indus­try 4.0 solu­ti­ons, we are still at the very begin­ning.

When it comes to the imple­men­ta­ti­on of Indus­try 3.0 (auto­ma­ti­on) and Indus­try 4.0 (digi­ta­li­za­ti­on), the level of matu­ri­ty is not homo­ge­neous throug­hout the sup­ply chain.
From my per­spec­tive, the hig­hest level is achie­ved wit­hin the Tier-1 area of sys­tem com­pon­ents (engi­nes, air con­di­tio­n­ing and avio­nics) with a repe­ti­ti­ve ser­vice busi­ness along the pro­duct life cycle.  The matu­ri­ty decrea­ses down­wards (Tier-2, Tier-3 sup­pliers) and is at a medi­um level for the OEMs

The aero­space indus­try always needs a lead pro­ject or pro­gram to dri­ve inno­va­ti­on to a cer­tain level;  Boe­ing 787 and Air­bus A350 are very good examp­les for dri­ving the use of car­bon fiber and increa­sing cabin/passenger com­fort to the next level, and this is now being trans­fer­red into other pro­grams. The imple­men­ta­ti­on of Indus­try 3.0 and 4.0 levers requi­res a pro­gram approach as well. The next gene­ra­ti­on of sin­gle-ais­le air­craft (fol­lo­wing A320neo and B737Max) is a per­fect fit, due to high volu­mes, a lar­ge num­ber of custo­mers, and their use in a very com­pe­ti­ti­ve air­line envi­ron­ment.

(Aut­hor: Micha­el San­to, h&z Mana­ging Part­ner)