The Future Road of Aviation Logistics Informatization

This article is forwarded from Jiuzhou Logistics Network, which comes from Luoge Network

The outbreak of New Coronary Pneumonia reflects the importance of the aviation logistics industry in all aspects, and also exposes some shortcomings of China's aviation logistics at this stage, which also makes me have new thoughts on the aviation logistics information industry I have been engaged in.

1、 Shortcomings in the development of aviation logistics industry

（1） Weak freight infrastructure

First, because of the traditional idea of "heavy passenger and light cargo", most airports in China lack plans for the development of air cargo during the planning and construction period. The ability of specialized freight transport is relatively weak, and airport freight transport has been "developed"; At the same time, the lack of top-level planning in the construction of freight facilities has led to no space for freight development in the mature and rapid development period of airport operation.

Second, the functions and processes of most domestic airport cargo facilities are basically planned and designed in the form of ordinary cargo, which is difficult to meet the actual needs of international mail, express and special cargo.

With the sudden outbreak of the epidemic and the rapid growth of cargo traffic, the operators of air logistics cargo stations feel unprecedented pressure. Some domestic airport cargo stations have experienced warehouse explosion and insufficient security and response capabilities, resulting in a large number of goods being overstocked in the warehouse. At the same time, a large number of trucks could not load and unload goods in time due to queuing in the warehouse area of the shipping station. Occasionally, aircraft could not be loaded on time, and empty aircraft left the port.

To sum up, it strongly reflects the lack of airport infrastructure, the lack of flexible design in the cargo terminal and warehouse area, the urgent need to optimize the security process, and the lack of industry informatization, which makes it impossible to cope with a large number of business pressures, and the lack of the ability to coordinate and manage the cargo operations of all relevant parties.

（2） The informatization of aviation logistics industry is backward

As early as the 1980s, when "informatization" was still a new term for many industries, the aviation industry had already started informatization. The aviation industry uses host system and special communication network to establish the global passenger and cargo sales network of airlines and the security management system of cargo station informatization; In the 1990s, China introduced the host based freight information system (FAST4) from abroad, and started the informatization of China's aviation logistics industry; In 1998, China Southern Airlines launched its cargo "online booking", linking the Internet and the aviation logistics industry together for the first time, and in 2001, it launched the world's first large airline cargo system based on open platforms and the Internet.

It can be said that the informatization of our aviation logistics industry started very early. However, today, the entire aviation logistics industry, whether in China or overseas, lags far behind the express delivery industry and our rapidly changing personal informatization.

Twenty years ago, there was a famous "Internet Survival" experiment in Beijing, where a person was locked in a room and given a computer to see how many days he could live. Now, on the other hand, how many days can a person live without the Internet? However, over the past 20 years, the informatization progress of our aviation logistics is far behind that of individuals or the whole society.

So what is the reason for the backwardness of our industry's information work?

First, the completion of the aviation logistics service chain depends on the airport, airlines, cargo agents, customs and other participants, spanning many provinces and cities and even countries. Each participant has its own information system, which is relatively independent and lacks data communication. Second, because the aviation industry has high requirements for safety, it has a certain degree of negative impact on business processes and information innovation. It is no wonder that the business innovation and informatization development of air cargo lags behind expectations due to the concession of safety work.

Fortunately, after the impact of the epidemic, the industry and the competent government departments have fully understood our current problems. The team of Express has been particularly busy in recent years. Not only at the enterprise level, but also the projects launched by airlines and airport information systems are increasing. At the government level, we see that CAAC has launched several large-scale information projects in the past year.

In 2021, the construction of the Shunfeng Transfer Center Project of Ezhou Airport, Asia's first aviation logistics hub, will be started. Shunfeng will choose YJ as its supplier of cargo operation management system for international cargo terminals. In the Shunfeng Ezhou project, COMS system is responsible for handling the inbound and outbound cargo terminal, ground truck transit and flight transit. COMS introduces fully automatic cargo positioning service to realize real-time monitoring of cargo location and cargo trajectory. COMS also provides the operation process and cargo station resource monitoring for the cargo station management, and provides data interface services for the customs single window, cargo station security check, airport AOC, SF Express and SF Express and other systems or departments - SF and Express will work together to build this project into a benchmark project for global aviation logistics.

At the government level, the AVIC Neutral Electronic Order Platform (DAP) project is a large-scale industrial project approved by the CAAC and participated in by Express. The core objectives of the project are: first, to solve the informatization of aviation logistics sales, and second, to solve the problem of information interconnection between different partners of aviation logistics at the operational level.

On June 23, 2022, the CAAC DAP project passed the final inspection successfully!

In the past ten years, Express and the aviation industry have carried out a lot of innovative research and development. In 2013, the cooperation between Express Express and Shunfeng Express was to provide a capacity management model for its air transport business, and to optimize the matching of cargo and different flight capacity through algorithms, so as to improve the transport efficiency of air express and reduce the cost of capacity procurement. In 2017, EasyExpress cooperated with China Post Aviation to implement the command and dispatching system of the airport apron, realize the standardization of flight support process, the automation of staff task dispatching, and the digitalization of the whole process of the airport apron, and successfully reduce the ground support time of each flight of Post Aviation by 20-30 minutes.

Ten years ago, EasyExpress creatively developed and implemented the world's first "Centralized Weight and Balance System" with China Post Aviation, concentrating the airline's W&B operations on the cloud, breaking through geographical and personnel constraints; In 2017, Air China Cargo realized the automatic load of the computer, completed the manual operation of one hour in a few seconds using computer algorithms, and realized the automatic optimization of the aircraft center of gravity (CG).

Reviewing the history of informatization in China's aviation logistics industry and reviewing our current situation, it can be concluded that most of our informatization work is still in the process of converting offline operations to online operations, which is the first stage of informatization. A large number of our informatization projects aim to turn "paper documents" into "electronic data", and a large number of operational transactions rely on manual driving or leading. In normal work scenarios, manual driving can work normally, but in the case of sudden business surges, such as the epidemic last year, a large amount of business data must be collected and responded in a timely manner. Now we rely on manual decision-making and judgment to immediately show problems. For example, during the epidemic period, a large number of goods could not be loaded and unloaded in time, a large number of trucks queued for a long time, and even the aircraft could not load goods and return empty after landing.

Aviation logistics is an industry highly dependent on information technology. Information technology can help the industry solve many problems. How should the aviation logistics industry carry out its information work?

2、 Future development focus of aviation logistics informatization

Before elaborating my views on the development of aviation logistics informatization, we need to first understand the nature of aviation logistics services. The aviation logistics service chain is long and there are many partners involved. From the consignor to the consignee, a cargo needs the cooperation of many participants, such as agents, security check, cargo terminal, apron operation, airlines, truck flight operators, customs, etc. The business links include: booking space, voucher preparation, collection, palletizing, stowage, message processing, loading, unloading, tally, extraction and settlement, payment, write off, etc.

Although the business content is complex, in essence, aviation logistics service content can be divided into two categories: sales management targeting at waybill and operation management targeting at aircraft/cargo. As shown below:

Next, I'd like to talk about my views on the future development of air logistics informatization, focusing on freight sales dominated by carriers and freight operations dominated by ground handling agents (GHA).

（1） Informatization of the carrier

For the carrier, the most important task is to maximize the value of aircraft cabin sales, as well as efficient use and safety management of aircraft.

The informatization of cargo space sales involves three key links: booking sales, freight settlement and customer service; The key links involved in the informatization of aircraft operation management related to logistics include: aircraft loading balance, crate management, terminal management, etc. It can be said that "booking+settlement" and "stowage+ULD" together constitute the core foundation of carrier flow business informatization.

After ten years of efforts, our medium and large freight carriers have established space booking systems and settlement systems, realizing the information operation of sales business. The freight booking and settlement system customers of Express include Hainan Airlines, Sichuan Airlines, Yuantong Airlines, Shenzhen Airlines, Changlong Airlines, China Post Airlines, JD Logistics, Hongyuan Group, etc.

In terms of the "stowage+ULD" system, almost all Chinese airlines operating cargo planes have put into operation the stowage and balance system of Express, including China International Cargo Airlines (China Cargo Airlines), China Post Airlines, Shunfeng Airlines, Sichuan Airlines Logistics, Longhao Airlines, etc.

So, what is the focus of the next stage of carrier flow business informatization?

In my opinion, first of all, freight direct marketing is the hotspot of airlines' informatization in the next stage. Airlines have a strong desire to promote the direct sales model, or to extend the sales system to small and medium-sized logistics enterprises with C-end customers. In 2020, EasyExpress, together with Xiamen Airlines, launched an airline freight direct marketing platform, which integrates the airline's "airport airport" air transportation service with the ground's "door-to-door pickup+delivery" service, helps airlines achieve sales and services directly to C-end customers and small and medium-sized logistics enterprises, expands the service radius of airlines, and expands the scope of airline customers from the original limited number of "freight forwarders", Expand to thousands of small and medium-sized logistics companies, even individuals.

In addition, freight direct marketing will promote the dynamic pricing of freight. Most of the current cabin prices are agreed in the tariff agreement signed by the airline and the agent, and some of the tariffs are negotiated by the airline and the agent during the booking. The share of direct sales and platform sales in airlines will continue to expand in the future, and airlines will gradually realize "revenue management" of freight rates.

Secondly, computer algorithms will play a more and more important role in the informatization of carrier flow. In the field of operation, the cooperation between EasyExpress and China International Cargo Airlines has introduced automatic stowage algorithm into the stowage and balance system of China Cargo Airlines. The test data of China Cargo Airlines shows that the computer loading algorithm can significantly optimize the gravity center index and save fuel consumption for airlines. For example, each flight can save 1% or 2% of fuel. For airlines, first, it can save fuel costs, and at the same time, it plays a positive role in achieving the goal of carbon neutrality and carbon peak.

In addition, information technology will help airlines effectively improve customer service. Airlines pay great attention to customer service. How to ensure that air cargo can arrive at the destination smoothly from the departure station according to the booking plan? How to better connect all links in such a long service chain? This is a scenario where the information system can solve and play an important role. The information system can monitor the work efficiency of each link and different service providers according to the service standards set by the airline, take the initiative to find exceptions and remind the relevant link service providers and carriers to solve problems before they occur. Our industry can also use this technology to improve the efficiency and security of our goods operation, and ultimately improve the level of our service to the shipper or freight forwarder.

（2） Informatization of operation agent

The core resource of the freight station is the ability of warehouse and ground operation. How to improve the efficiency of warehouse process and ground operation? Compared with the current manual command and operation mechanism, digital operation, and the application of computer algorithms and artificial intelligence in the industry, the overall operation efficiency of ground support can be greatly improved.

In 2017, the airport apron command and dispatching system, which was jointly developed by Eugene Express and China Post Aviation, was simply built into the system in Phase I of the project, and then the command and dispatching of personnel was online. One evaluation data actually used by China Post Aviation is that the flight ground support time can be compressed to about 20 minutes. As you know, for the 737/757 narrow body aircraft operated by Postal Aviation, it is very considerable to have 20 minutes of ground support time compression.

In the next stage, we will give it an intelligent algorithm for loading shift scheduling and dispatching in the command and dispatching. I expect that the efficiency of ground operation will be improved a lot.

Another development direction of aviation logistics ground operation agent informatization is unmanned and automation. The current labor cost of our ground operation service provider is a very important burden. Therefore, the use of this logistics automation equipment, such as AGV, the application of this new type of equipment in the air cargo terminal, is an inevitable choice for our industry. The application of AGV in the freight station is inseparable from the software's control of the AGV system. The software effectively integrates and connects the business flow of AGV and our freight station, and then uses the business data to drive the automatic equipment of AGV through the software. I think this must be a key development point of information technology for our ground operation service providers.

3、 Stories about Express

Eugene was founded 10 years ago. At the beginning of its establishment, there were only 3 members in the team. I worked in China Southern Airlines for 6 years before I founded Express. In 1998, at China Southern Airlines, I led the research and development, implementation and promotion of China Southern Airlines' "Freight Global Online Tracking System" and "Online Booking System". For the first time, I came into contact with the aviation logistics business and found that there was much to be done in this field. At the end of 1999, I successfully persuaded the senior management of China Southern Airlines that China Southern Airlines should independently develop the airline freight system to replace the FAST4 host system of the then CAAC Information Center (the predecessor of AVIC Information). As the project leader, he led the team of China Southern Airlines to successfully complete the research and development of the world's first open platform large airline freight system ("Tangyi"). A long time after leaving China Southern Airlines, I was labeled as the founder of "Tang Yi" by the industry.

We founded the first business of Express, which came from the cooperation with IBM to jointly undertake the logistics center system project of Nanjing Lukou Airport. After more than ten years of development, we have always adhered to the original intention of focusing on providing information services for the aviation logistics industry. At present, our customers cover the carrier, ground operation agent and logistics express industry.

In the carrier field, 7 of the 8 largest cargo carriers in China are customers of Express, including China International Cargo Airlines, China Southern Airlines, China Post Airlines, Hainan Airlines, Shunfeng Airlines, Yuantong Airlines, Sichuan Airlines Logistics, etc; In the field of ground operation, Ezhou Shunfeng International Cargo Terminal, the first in Asia, announced last month that it would choose Eugene Express as its supplier of cargo terminal system. Shunfeng will work with Eugene Express to create a benchmark project for the future. Our customers in the field of ground operation also include Shanghai Airport Group, Bao'an Airport, Tianjin Huayu, Haikou Meilan Airport, Sanya Phoenix Airport, Nanchang Changbei Airport, Zhuhai Airport, etc.

(Focusing on R&D for ten years, with accumulated experience)

Looking back, there are two important reasons for our achievements. First, we were founded in the "right" country. China is a great country with huge market demand; Second, we have developed in a "right" period. The past 10 years have also been a decade of rapid development of China's aviation industry. From the initial stage of our establishment, China has only about 30-40 cargo aircraft, and now there are nearly 200 cargo aircraft. The substantial growth of the number means that airlines will carry out more intercontinental flights, and the demand for cargo systems will be higher and more diversified. We seize this opportunity to constantly develop new products, provide customers with more perfect and systematic services, and grow together with our industry to become what we are today.

Looking forward to the future, we will accelerate the introduction of intelligent algorithms, big data and other cutting-edge technologies into the aviation logistics industry; We will also speed up the integration and application of products similar to AGV with more air logistics cargo station business operation scenarios, further reducing the manpower and operating costs of the cargo station, and improving work efficiency. In the application of AGV and automation products, there are many successful cases in other logistics industries. However, to introduce aviation scenarios, a lot of R&D and testing work needs to be done, and a lot of technical difficulties need to be overcome to make bold breakthroughs and innovations. However, these challenges are the responsibilities and opportunities of our Express and aviation logistics enterprises.

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