SESAR: 30 projects in 30 days

In 30 days, 30 projects have taken off to support the creation of Europes future Air Traffic Management system. Amongst them are three projects addressing the future aviation intranet, wi-fi ATM communication at airports and satellite aircraft precision landing system. The SESAR Joint Undertaking, a unique public-private partnership in air traffic management (ATM) research and development founded by the European Commission and Eurocontrol, is going to harmonize the air traffic management in Europe. The Programme comprises 16 work packages and 295 projects to be carried out between 2009 and 2016. These packages will develop and deliver the necessary operational and technical materials (specifications, procedures, prototypes, validation activities, etc) for the progressive deployment of the new European Air Traffic Management system.

Since the signature of the contracts one month ago on June 12th, 30 projects have already started equalling to one new SESAR project per day. Amongst these are the following three projects as examples:

Project GBAS Cat II/III for the development of satellite aircraft precision landing systems

Project SWIM Air-Ground Capability for the design of the future aviation intranet;

Project Airport Surface Datalink on Wi-Fi standards for the communication between all actors on the airport ground surface.

In total, 124 projects are planned to be launched in 2009.

Sixteen members have joined the SESAR Joint Undertaking: AENA, Airbus, Alenia Aeronautica, the DFS, the DSNA, ENAV, Eurocontrol, Frequentis, Honeywell, INDRA, NATMIG, NATS (En Route) Limited, NORACON, SEAC, SELEX Sistemi Integrati and Thales. Several members are made up of consortiums which are raising the total number of members directly and indirectly bound to SESAR to up to 35. Those 35 companies have also affiliates and sub-contractors. As a total result, 70 companies are part of SESAR demonstrating the impact of the programme on the ATM R&D activities in Europe. This is a very intense and promising period and we really feel now that the SESAR programme is alive and kicking. From a project management point of view, SESAR is one of the most complex programmes you can imagine: 295 projects managed by a total of 70 companies. We know what the notion of unique public-private partnership means in practice at SESAR! commented Patrick Ky, Executive Director of the SESAR Joint Undertaking. SESAR new components and operational procedures will be gradually implemented as from 2012 till 2020.