The Hindu Business Line : Survey sees higher IT spending by airports

AIRPORTS across the world, on an average, spend four per cent of their revenue on information technology (IT) and telecommunications investments. But this figure is expected to grow, says the `Airport IT Trends Survey-2004', released earlier this month.

Commissioned by Airline Telecommunications and Information Services (SITA), Airports Council International and Airline Business magazine, the study declares that 60 per cent of the airports surveyed intend to increase IT and telecommunications investments this year.

The survey, which was launched in the last quarter of 2003, focuses on technology trends, strategic issues, outsourcing and security issues related to the application of IT in airports. Forty-eight leading airports from across the world, accounting for approximately 50 per cent of industry revenues, participated in the survey.

For airports intending to increase IT investments this year, the top priorities are network infrastructure (69 per cent) and security solutions (63 per cent). Passenger and baggage processing systems (44 per cent) and integration of existing IT systems (43 per cent) are other important priorities for the respondents.

With security-related IT investments being a major priority, it is not surprising that 25 per cent of the airports surveyed already use biometric identification technology for employees, with this figure expected to rise to 50 per cent by 2006. While none of the airports surveyed currently use biometric identification technology for passengers, four per cent of the respondents plan to implement such systems by the end of the year and another 19 per cent plan to have biometric identification systems in the next two years.

Interestingly, 56 per cent of the airports surveyed currently have no plans to introduce biometric identification measures for passengers. Among the available biometric techniques , fingerprints, hand geometry and facial recognition are the most popular techniques, with iris-scanning trials just beginning.

As a part of the effort to use IT to improve customer service in airports, almost all the respondents intend to offer wireless and Web services in terminals. While 44 per cent of the airports surveyed already offer wireless access in terminals, 56 per cent want to offer this facility in the next two years. Similarly, 44 per cent of the respondents already offer Web services, while 52 per cent want to do so by 2006.

Application of technology in areas such as baggage tracking is still restricted to a small number of airports, with eight per cent of the respondents using radio frequency identification (RFID) for tracking passenger baggage and four per cent for tracking cargo. However by 2006, 25 per cent of the respondents intend to use RFID tags for both passenger baggage and cargo.

Moreover, for most airports the chief obstacle to implementing IT strategies appears to be the lack of investment, with 56 per cent of the respondents highlighting this aspect. Similarly, the absence of an accepted, airport-wide IT strategy (46 per cent) and the need to spend additional resources on increased security (40 per cent) also figured as major obstacles to the implementation of IT projects in airports.