Build, prove and get results internally and take it to customers. This is what GE Aviation did with their data and analytics expertise internally and are taking externally to help customers. Realizing more than $700 million in overall productivity gains by digitizing their own equipment and operations, it made sense to use the same digital technologies to help commercial and military customers.

An example of these digital technologies announced at Farnborough this week, Austrian Airlines renewed and expanded an agreement with GE Aviation to provide Flight Operations Quality Assurance (eFOQA) software and technologies across their growing fleet of more than 80 aircraft.

“We highly appreciate the eFOQA service provided by GE,” said Dr. Jochen Mickel, senior director Safety & Compliance Monitoring Ops for Austrian Airlines. “On the one hand, the secure cloud based solution ensures the infrastructure costs within our company are kept to a minimum (e.g. reduced hardware requirement), thus reducing costs and internal efforts - and on the other hand the eFOQA service grants flexible high-speed access to GE’s Event Management System (EMS) accompanied by excellent product support. As a result, we successfully focus on improving safety in our operation using the sophisticated EMS FOQA software.”

It’s not only about the amount of data, but the quality of the data that is important. GE Aviation’s eFOQA service uses flight data generated by the aircraft and its systems and applies proprietary data management and analytics technology to help Austrian Airlines better manage their fleet, providing previously unavailable insight into their operations.

“Our history with eFOQA, EMS, and how we’ve worked through the appropriate ways for engines to use that data is key to why we’re able to build trusting relationships with customers,” said Jon Dunsdon, chief technology officer for GE Aviation. The company has recently been selected by major U.S. airlines in this space.

GE Aviation has a rich history in full flight data analysis, both through eFOQA and engines in enabling asset performance management (APM). Dunsdon continued, “GE Aviation has been selected in the APM domain for a number of reasons including our history of full flight data analytics, our position that it is the customers data, our unwavering position on protection and control of that data, and our willingness to partner with our customers rather than black box solutions.”

Evidence of these partnerships announced at Farnborough are agreements with Microsoft and Teradata.  GE Aviation and Microsoft announced they are joining forces to accelerate digital transformation of Aviation, aimed at delivering more robust solutions for the industry.  GE Aviation’s Digital Solutions business is building on the broad capabilities of Microsoft’s Azure, combining GE’s data and analytics domain expertise, with the scale of Microsoft Azure.

“Microsoft’s cloud, with its strong enterprise capability, including global reach, scale and security were all important in our decision to partner with them,” said John Mansfield, chief digital officer for GE Aviation.  “The collaboration reinforces our ability to deliver hybrid, on-premise and cloud solutions across the enterprise which is critical for data protection, regulatory and efficiency.”

With Teradata, GE Aviation announced that they will become the exclusive provider of Teradata products and services for commercial aviation markets. This will provide the world’s biggest airlines with a single, comprehensive framework that combines high-performance analytics in the cloud from Teradata with edge-connectivity services from GE Aviation.

Teradata and GE Aviation previously announced a partnership to jointly provide products and services to commercial aviation markets. The two companies are extending this relationship to provide airlines with wide-ranging operational insights that power impactful business decisions.

“We can provide the best analytic environment for airline customers by adding Teradata’s powerful analytic solutions with built-in support for hybrid cloud environments,” said John Mansfield, chief digital officer of GE Aviation. “This partnership enables us to bring a holistic framework of enterprise data and business solutions to airlines.”

Stay tuned for additional activity in the digital space. The digital world continues to change. GE Aviation is continuing to increase the fidelity of quality data and analytics to increase productivity.