Spot-on Baggage Distribution

Abstract

At a time when airline business is facing a very competitive period, the strategy took up to shape thefuture is crucial. Airlines need to continuously invest in innovative IT solutions which enable them to improve and optimize specific processes rapidly. Amadeus IT Group provides an extended variety of pioneering IT and Distribution Solutions to this market. Altéa Departure Control Systems (DCS) are the Amadeus solutions designed to automate key airport services. The purpose of this master thesis was to specify, design and implement a working prototype of an interface that integrates two airport IT Solutions; Altéa Departure Control Flight and Altéa Baggage Reconciliation System (BRS). The prototype’s main goal was to demonstrate a usable interface between the two systems providing benefits to airlines in terms of weight and balance engineering operations and a complete baggage tracking. The first phase of this project involved to become familiar with both systems, from goals to functionalities. Afterwards, a complete pre-study was dedicated to investigating message formats in the airline industry and current flows of information between Altéa DCS. In addition, a user study was conducted mainly focusing on agents activities concerning loading processes to determine the needs and requirements of the FM-BRS Interface users. Functional requirements were gathered from various meetings in which team members representatives from both teams attended. The prototype was evaluated in different test environments with expert representatives from Customer Management Baggage Team and Flight Management Team. The result of the 6-month thesis is a first prototype of a standalone interface which tolerates a flow of communications not only between these two Amadeus Systems, but also with other DCS or BRS. A qualitative analysis shows the benefits that can be archived if the interface is implemented by airlines. The analysis’ conclusions are used to assess results obtained whilst testing the prototype. To conclude, a feasibility study suggested that further work needs to be put in the prototype in terms of functionalities and messages format selection.