Dubai: The Dubai International, one of the world’s busiest airports, will soon deploy location technology pilot programmes in a bid to enhance customer experience, according to executives from the programmes.
Thousands of bluetooth beacons have already been deployed all around the world in airports, retail stores, museums and sports stadiums. The technology helps user locate where they are, what’s around them and where they need to be.
Neetan Chopra, Senior Vice President IT Strategic Services, D-17 Emirates Group IT, said in an interview at Gitex on Sunday that Emirates will roll out beacon technology throughout Terminal 3 in November and December.
Beacons are small battery powered devices that transmit signals through a low energy Bluetooth antenna. Applications can use the signal to pinpoint your location to find nearby amenities and directions such as where to board a flight.
Under the Emirates pilot programme, select passengers flying out of Dubai International will have an a Bluetoth Low Energy (BLE) beacon tag placed on the luggage, helping the airline track it from check-in to the airplane. The idea is to cut the amount of lost luggage.
Dubai International handled 66 million passengers in 2013 with the bulk coming from Emirates. Dnata, the Emirates Group company responsible for ground handling services at Dubai’s airports, expects to handle 1.2 pieces of luggage per passenger meaning that around 79.2 million pieces of luggage were handled at the airport last year.
Chopra said Emirates has started other pilots using location technology including using sensors on unit load devices (ULD), which is a pallet used to load cargo and luggage on wide-body and certain narrow body aircraft and temperature sensors on aircraft.
Dubai Airports roll-out:
Dubai Airports is launching its own pilot at Dubai International using beacon technology in its bid to become more customer focused. Management recently said the airport is likely to be the busiest for international passenger traffic in 2014 after placing second behind London Heathrow last year.
Matthew Horobin, Senior Manager Digital Media at Dubai Airports told Gulf News by phone that Dubai International is rolling out its pilot in the first quarter next year and is likely to test it with passengers in Emirates’ Terminal 3 as well as Terminal 1, which is used by other airlines.
Horobin said the roll out of beacon is “really close” and that Dubai Airports expects “to introduce proprietary technology infrastructure.”
Dubai Airports announced on Sunday the launch of its mobile application in conjunction with Gitex Technology week. Horobin said the application is a value added service for customers using the airport. “This is a platform for us to move the airport into a personal space,” he said.
Horobin declined to state how many initial downloads Dubai Airports has targeted, however, said would first focus on the local and regional travellers to download the application.
