In business aviation, we've always been slow to adopt new technologies. For decades, we relied heavily on fax machines to communicate crucial information, and surprisingly, we still need them for certain tasks (US customs, anyone?). While other industries have raced ahead with digital transformation, business aviation has taken a more reluctant approach.
It may be that business aviation is a “complex matter,” as an inspector from a European civil aviation authority recently remarked. We use sophisticated equipment, offer a bespoke customer experience, and fly to almost any destination worldwide, 24/7, often with just a few hours' notice.
Over time, we have seen operators, brokers, passengers, MROs, OEMs, and service companies introduce software to tackle specific challenges. We have seen flight scheduling systems, software for safety management, and solutions for the flight deck, like the “Electronic Flight Bag.” There’s a piece of software for every isolated need. However, each solution has largely addressed only a small piece of the larger puzzle.
But what we are missing is the bigger picture, and the next step in the process.
A Patchwork of Solutions: Navigating the Isolated Software Landscape
What we see today is a landscape filled with disconnected systems—often from different vendors for the same type of task—used concurrently! We see this with flight planning software that doesn’t integrate with the operator’s other software or with the immediate needs of the flight crew, two different maintenance systems used in parallel—one for Part 145 and one for Part M—or communication platforms that don’t sync with other operational tools. To bridge the gaps, we resort to spreadsheets, rely on countless email threads, and invest enormous amounts of human energy to make sense of fragmented data.
And that’s where many in the industry have stopped. We return home after a long day of work and don’t remember what we have actually done, because most of the day was spent reading and sending hundreds of emails, and connecting information extracted from different data sources sitting in various systems. Yet we believe that the job is done—because haven’t we introduced a lot of technology?
Some look further than that. As Robert Jacobi, co-founder of the digital transformation advisory firm Nunatak in Munich, aptly puts it, we should “regard digital technology and methods as a means to an end, not the end itself.” Yet, in business aviation, we often act as though simply having technology is the endgame.
But is it enough just to digitize? What is the ultimate goal we are trying to achieve?
Beyond Software: Unlocking the Power of Data and Context
It’s not just about introducing technology; it’s about what we do with the data that technology generates. We need to ask ourselves: What about the data itself? What about the context behind that data? How do we leverage this information to drive efficiency, improve decision-making, and unlock new opportunities?
Here is a nice example of data with no context. What’s the correlation between the number if deaths on a planet and the existence of birds ? None! Data without context is jut noise.
did you know birds are the leading cause of death in the universe ?
Without context and texture, data remains isolated, making it impossible to derive actionable insights or make informed decisions. Context turns data into knowledge, allowing you to understand the bigger picture and act accordingly.
Many in business aviation find themselves in a digital limbo: while significant strides have been made in digitizing processes, we haven’t fully realized what comes next. We see isolated, partially digital systems that create more data than we can effectively use or understand. To truly move forward, we must focus on the next critical steps: Connect. Automate. Accelerate.
Digitize: Digitizing processes is important, but it's only the first step.
Connect: We must bridge the gap between various systems, ensuring data can flow seamlessly across the entire ecosystem.
Automate: Once connected, we can begin automating repetitive tasks, reducing the burden on human resources and minimizing error-prone processes.
Accelerate: With connected, automated systems in place, we can focus on accelerating the pace of business—delivering better experiences to passengers, optimizing operations, and making data-driven decisions in real-time.
The Future of Business Aviation: A Holistic Digital Transformation
The future of business aviation lies in connecting these disparate data silos and streamlining our organizational processes. Only by embracing a more holistic approach to digital transformation can we make real progress. This means shifting our perspective from seeing software as a box to be checked, to viewing it as a tool that can enable deeper insights, better connectivity, and true automation.
By doing this, we can harness the full potential of digital technology—not as an end, but as a means to something far greater: a more efficient, responsive, and forward-thinking aviation industry.
Let's keep pushing forward—because the best is yet to come.
If you are going to attend NBAA - BACE in Las Vegas next week, would like to discuss this further, and learn more how JetManager addresses these problems already today, please reach out!