Airbus Operations GmbH – Cargo tracking & monitoring

Description of the company
Airbus is a global leader in aeronautics, space and related services. It offers the most comprehensive range of passenger airliners from 100 to more than 600 seats. Airbus is also a European leader providing tanker, combat, transport and mission aircraft, as well as Europe’s number one space enterprise and the world’s second largest space business. In helicopters, Airbus provides the most efficient civil and military rotorcraft solutions worldwide.

Initial situation
Tracking & monitoring devices for cargo shipments are common means in land and sea transport, but air cargo is still a black hole in the supply chain.
Air cargo deals with high value, short-dated and perishable goods. To know precisely about the location & the condition of the shipment would bring valuable information to stakeholders and customers.

Problem
Several stakeholders of the supply chain start to use tracking & monitoring devices to collect location and conditions of shipments, but these highly customized solutions are not standardized and often not certified for usage onboard aircrafts (e.g. most of them must switch off the connectivity interfaces while transported inside aircrafts).

Aims of the project
The project shall provide an overview of technologies and standards for tracking and monitoring of air cargo.
Derived from that, the project shall deliver

·    concepts for aircraft multi-platform systems that can communicate / interact with different kind of existing track & trace / monitoring solutions
·    concepts for alternative technologies for a seamless end-to-end supply chain including air transport

Scopes

·    Technology screening: overview of technologies that could be applied for end-to-end tracking and monitoring of air cargo
·    Assessment of applicability of end-to-end tracking and monitoring technologies for usage onboard aircraft (incl. pros/cons)
·    Market analysis: available tracking & monitoring solutions for air cargo
·    Regulatory analysis: international rules and standards, airline approvals etc.
·    Conception: concepts for an aircraft onboard system that can interact with available tracking & monitoring services for air cargo

Target group
Motivated students that are interested in working in a multi-disciplinary team,  e.g. from

·    Logistics, Infrastructure & Mobility
·    Information and Communication Systems
·    General Engineering Science
·    Electrical engineering
·    Informatics / computer science

Knowledge of

·    Digitalisation (communication, IoT, M2M, Industry 4.0, etc.)
·    Logistics
·    Automation

would be helpful.

Dates
Please reserve these dates:

• 17 October: Information event with te companies, from 10am to 12pm, mainbuilding A; LuK
• 24 October: Kick-off event, from 2pm to 6pm (obligatory attendance)
• 27 October and 3 November: Project management course, full day (obligatory attendance)
• Order clarification: 01.11., 13 - 15:00 Uhr,  Zentrum für Angewandte Luftfahrtforschung (ZAL), Hein-Saß-Weg 22 in 21129 Hamburg