Infotech Lead America: General Electric, a provider of avionics and software development, is going Cloud.
The 18-month project with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) will enable GE to take air traffic management (ATM) technology into the Cloud.
GE said Cloud computing will enable airlines and air traffic controllers to perform their tasks by sharing real-time information, data analysis and decision support tools to improve aircraft operations and airspace efficiency.
GE’s program with NASA will identify opportunities within ATM that can benefit from cloud computing.
Airlines, pilots, and air traffic controllers will be able to achieve increased information exchange, sharing of decision support automation capabilities that tell them more accurately and reliably about a plane’s current position and future flight path. This will enable them to improve traffic flow and plan preferable routes and altitudes, which ultimately means more predictable and efficient travel that is on-time for passengers,” said Liling Ren, electrical engineer and project leader from GE Global Research.
A key program objective is to explore how air traffic controllers, airlines and aircraft can interact more efficiently in a cloud computing environment. Today ATM functionalities and capabilities are developed and hosted separately by each of these entities. The expectation is that this project can help accelerate the transition of NextGen ATM technology, which traditionally would take years or even over a decade to complete.
The effort to bring cloud computing to air traffic management is part of GE’s efforts to build the Industrial Internet. The Industrial Internet represents the next evolution in product development, creating a living network of intelligent machines and systems that allows customers to realize new heights of efficiency and performance in their operations.
GE researchers will combine its growing capabilities in software with deeply embedded experience in aviation and avionics to revolutionize air traffic management.
