Lufthansa Technik, a global leader in Maintenance, Repair, and Overhaul (MRO) services, has established a formidable presence in Asia, reflecting the region’s growing significance in the aviation industry. Embracing a robust growth strategy, the company aims to further strengthen its core business while capitalizing on the opportunities presented by digitalization and adjacent fields. As a result, Lufthansa Technik is continually adapting to industry trends, incorporating advanced technologies such as artificial intelligence and digital fleet solutions to enhance its maintenance services. Recent collaborations with airlines like TUI highlight the practical benefits of these innovations, improving maintenance efficiency and reducing costs for their fleet operations.
With an unwavering commitment to safety, quality, and innovation, Lufthansa Technik’s vision for the future encompasses pioneering solutions, strategic partnerships, and expansion into new markets, all geared towards maintaining its leadership position in a rapidly evolving aviation landscape. More in detail as Dominik Nixdorf, Head of Corporate Strategy & Market Analytics at Lufthansa Technik is in Conversation with MRO Business Today. READ ON……
Q – Lufthansa Technik has established a robust presence in Asia through various mainteance facilities and partnerships. Could you elaborate on the significance of the Asian market for Lufthansa Technik, and the company’s plans for expanding its operations in the region?
Ans – Lufthansa Technik will continue its growth strategy. We will expand our leading position in the MRO industry by strengthening our core business, leveraging the efficiency and business opportunities of digitalization, and establishing capabilities in adjacent fields.
With this aspiration, we must have a strong regional position in all three world regions. Especially in Asia, we are observing a highly fragmented market environment that demands very specific market approaches in each subregion, and sometimes in each county. It is very important to us to create a tailored and robust value proposition. One example for this would be Mobile Engine Service (MES). Our customers want to utilize their engines as much as possible, and we can exactly meet this essential customer demand with surgical repair and short, reliable TATs. With MES, our customers can benefit from Lufthansa Technik’s engineering and overhaul network expertise. To be able to offer this but also other services to even more customers, one of the identified levers is the expansion of our APAC footprint. This expansion is a combination of organic growth that is driven from our core, with investments in our own production facilities and, where sensible in terms of speed, access to new customer groups, availability of talents, etc., and by acquiring capability.
Q – With the increasing prevalence of digitalization and artificial intelligence in aviation maintenance, how is Lufthansa Technik adapting to these trends and incorporating them into its services?
Ans – In 2017, Lufthansa Technik established its Digital Fleet Solutions business unit and launched the AVIATAR platform. For the first time in our industry, AVIATAR combined fleet management solutions, data science and engineering expertise with digital services and products. Since then, the platform has been continuously developed as we use customer feedback to optimize the user-centric design of AVIATAR. Together with flydocs, the leading digital records and asset solution, and Swiss Aviation Software AG, the provider of the market leading maintenance and engineering software AMOS, we created an entire Digital TechOps Ecosystem. The three units remain independent but combine their previously modular product design. For the first time, it is possible to cover all data generated along the entire value stream for technical operations. The new integrated system will improve process efficiency and operational stability, increase aircraft availability, and enhance their value.
Nevertheless, we are very aware of the fact that we are and will continue to be a provider of physical services. Here, we successfully drive our “Digitize the Core” program, which leverages further efficiency and cost advantages across the entire value creation chain.
Q – TUI Airlines has recently adopted Lufthansa Technik’s Aviatar health management solutions. Could you elaborate on the benefits of this technology in terms of improving maintenance and reducing costs for airlines?
Ans – TUI’s five airlines from the UK, Scandinavia, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Germany use AVIATAR’s condition monitoring application to manage their fleet of 130 aircraft. With a focus on technical operations (TechOps), AVIATAR’s digital solutions for Boeing 787 and 737 aircraft enable TUI’s maintenance operations control engineers to monitor and predict the technical condition of the airline’s fleet. This allows TechOps to improve the planning, coordination and preparation of maintenance tasks and other required activities to maximize the reliable operation of the airline’s fleet. TechOps is immediately notified on the main dashboard when a critical system status occurs on one the aircraft, allowing quick and thorough analysis of the situation, also using other apps available on AVIATAR. By combining operational fleet data with data from maintenance, engineering and information systems like AMOS or Trax, previous actions can be tracked when a specific failure occurs, and the customer can immediately react accordingly – this saves time and costs.
Q – How does Lufthansa Technik maintain the highest standards of safety and quality in its maintenance and repair services?
Ans – Safety and responsibility are the core values and have the highest priority at Lufthansa Technik. From my point of view, safety and quality starts with our Lufthansa culture, with the mindset of each and every of my colleagues. For example, we never stop learning and improving. Quality managers from our entire Lufthansa Technik Group regularly exchange information and ideas to ensure knowledge is rapidly transferred across our facilities.
We all are working very hard to keep quality as an intrinsic part of all our processes. We therefore employ a unique management system to ensure that all aspects of quality are fully integrated, continuously improved, and are standardized. Our integrated management system plays a critical role in maintaining our authority approvals around the globe. It ensures that we remain certified to quality standards and environmental management standard as well as international standard for health & safety in our worldwide MRO operations.
Secondly, the highest quality is a strong source of competitive advantage for Lufthansa Technik, and therefore very relevant for our business success. This means a customer can rely on our quality promise in our complete operations network through our certified maintenance, design, and production and CAMO organization.
Q – What is Lufthansa Technik’s vision for the future of aviation maintenance, and how does the company plan to maintain its leadership position in an industry that is constantly evolving?
Ans – As mentioned before, Lufthansa Technik has the ambition to build on its leading MRO market position. Therefore, we will play an active role in consolidation and partnership discussions in the years to come. We formulated a clear strategy across three levels.
First, our efficient core MRO offer is and will remain the heart and soul of our operations. Our relevance in the market is based on the broad portfolio and profound capabilities we have that creates competitive advantages.
Second, the industry is transforming and we aim to pioneer new solutions. Our digital transformation serves as a good example. By combining digital know how with our engineering and technical operations expertise, we can offer better service and set industry standards with AVIATAR and our TechOps Ecosystem.
Third, we are expanding our established footprint in new and adjacent businesses. We are transferring our expertise into new products and business models to create more value for customers beyond core MRO. This includes for example new digital cabin solutions or green tech solutions. We just recently launched AeroSHARK which imitates the characteristics of hydrodynamic sharkskin, reducing drag which leads to less fuel consumption.
To conclude, I feel very confident that we have set the right ambition and have the means and mindset to realize our goals. In my view, it is the combining factor of our joint purpose here at Lufthansa Technik that will keep us on track and successful in an evolving industry.
“With our passion for aviation we make the world take off.”
