Indra set to standardize Air Traffic Management systems and reinforce the single sky in Central America

Indra has been awarded a 24.6-million-euro contract to upgrade and integrate the air traffic control (ATC) systems of Corporacion Centroamericana de Servicios de Navegación Aerea (COCESNA). This is a pioneering project to strengthen the single sky in Central America that is similar to initiatives currently being carried out in Europe, the United States and Canada.

Indra’s technology will be implemented in the six COCESNA member countries (Belize, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Honduras, Guatemala and Nicaragua). A total of nine air traffic control centers will be modernized and harmonized. Moreover, all will be equipped with the most advanced communications system on the market featuring fully digital technology, including CENAMER, from where all of Central America’s upper airspace is controlled.

The project will incorporate innovative changes in the traditional architecture, entailing the de facto creation of a network of control centers that will be able to assume, if necessary, functions of the other centers. This will increase redundancy and provide the highest levels of security and resilience.

The agreement demonstrates Indra’s commitment to Latin America and the company’s leadership in bringing the most innovative technologies it develops to the entire world, in order to guarantee more efficient, safe and profitable flights while contributing to the sector’s greater sustainability.

In fact, this ambitious project will also contribute to improving the efficiency and sustainability of operations, leading to reductions in aircraft emissions and fuel consumption.

The six-year contract is worth 24.6 million euros and will allow for three software upgrades of the control centers. This will ensure that they always have the most advanced functions and the latest hardware technology, as well as compliance with the international regulations of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), the United Nations agency that regulates civil aviation around the world.

As a result of this project with Indra, COCESNA will become the first air navigation service provider in Latin America with a fully interconnected, integrated and homogeneous set of spaces.

Technological leadership

Indra has a close relationship with COCESNA and is the technology provider for the systems that are currently in service in the region. The company is leading the modernization of air traffic management in Latin America and has secured the major contracts awarded in recent years.

Its systems are in operation in practically all the countries in the area; it has modernized 70% of the control centers in Latin America (30 centers in total), installed its systems in most of the control towers and deployed close to fifty air traffic surveillance radars and a similar number of radio navigation systems. A total of five hundred ATM systems with Indra’s hallmark support in air traffic management on the subcontinent.

Indra is also one of the main providers of air traffic systems in the world, with over 6,000 installations deployed in more than 90% of the world’s countries, while its technology can be found on the flights of over 85% of passengers during at least one phase of their trip. Its instrument landing systems have also guided over 200 million safe landings at more than 1,400 runways around the world.

In addition to working with ANSPs, airlines and entities around the world, the company partners the leading international aviation organizations so as to accelerate the introduction of new technologies, advance their standardization and modernize global air traffic management.