Prestigious
Airline Strategy Award for Digital
Leadership conferred by FlightGlobal for the scale and speed of the airline’s significant digital transformation
LONDON – Air
India, India’s leading global airline, has been recognized with the Airline
Strategy Award for Digital Leadership by FlightGlobal, a premier UK-based global
platform of news and data for aviation and aerospace industries. The award is
in recognition of Air India’s digital transformation after its return to the
Tata Group.
The award was received by Air
India’s Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director Campbell Wilson and its
Chief Digital and Technology Officer Satya Ramaswamy at an event organized in
London by FlightGlobal in partnership with management consulting firm Korn
Ferry.
The
Airline Strategy Award is considered as a leading annual award recognizing
airline leadership and excellence achieved in select few categories with the
recipients selected by an independent panel of domain experts, comprising industry
analysts, consultants and former airline CEOs. Air India is the sole recipient
of the award this year while United Airlines and Ryan Air had won the award in
previous years.
The
award for Digital Leadership acknowledged the impactful progress
made by Air India in its digital transformation since the takeover by the Tata
Group in 2022. The airline had embarked on a technology-powered reinvention
embracing emerging digital and AI solutions to drive a significant transformation
of the company and turning a structural weakness into a strength.
Campbell Wilson, Chief Executive Officer
and Managing Director, Air India, said: “We are honoured to receive the prestigious Airline
Strategy Award for Digital Leadership from FlightGlobal. The recognition is a
testament to the progress Air India has made since its return to the Tata Group
and reaffirms the commitment of Air Indians driving our transformation journey.
Our digital initiatives are playing a key role in enhancing customer
experience, empowering our employees, and driving operational excellence. It is
indeed a proud moment for all of us in Air India to have the scale, speed and
impact of our digital journey recognised by one of the aviation industry’s most
respected institutions. It reinforces our belief that technology will continue
to be a key differentiator powering Air India’s aspiration to become a
world-class global airline."
Dr
Satya Ramaswamy, Chief Digital and
Technology Officer, Air India,
said: “Today, digital
technologies, including Artificial Intelligence have become pervasive and
critical operational foundations of any airline. They also play a decisive role
in elevating customer experiences and ensuring peak operational performance
resulting in enduring competitive advantage. Starting with a base of a handful of
systems, we have laid down an extensive digital landscape with more than 140
systems in Air India after its return to the Tata Group. Our guests today enjoy
the benefit of world-class channels such as our award-winning mobile app. Our
operations benefit from the extensive set of enterprise systems and
consumer-like interfaces of our employee systems. We are grateful that
FlighGlobal, a globally venerated organisation in the aviation industry, has
recognised the scale and speed of Air India’s digital transformation with the Digital
Leadership award.”
Powered by the vision of becoming one of the most
technologically advanced airlines in the world, Air India has been on a mission
to improve its customer experience and operational efficiencies deploying the
best of modern digital technologies in a short period of time.
•
Built
a world-class
cloud-only digital landscape, with 140+ modern enterprise systems from scratch.
Completed this roll
out within a period of around 2 years, compared to industry average of 10+
years for a transformation of this scale.
• Created a globally recognised digital consumer channels, that delight
customers and simplify their journeys. Globally acclaimed modern website,
mobile apps, notifications system, generative AI virtual agent, Inflight
Entertainment systems have been rolled out. Air India’s mobile apps have been
downloaded 17 million times and have a stellar 4.8-star rating in both the
Apple App Store and Google Play store in India.
• Built a data and
analytics systems to power a data-driven decision-making culture across all
departments. Data-driven insights delivered across customer
touchpoints, including in the air through crew iPads, powering an
empathetic, customer-centric culture in the airline.
• Created employee channels & apps that are persona-driven and
contextual, to deliver excellent employee experience. Eliminated
paper-based operations and cumbersome employee experiences by implementing
fully digitized channels and apps for employees from pilots to cabin crew to
ground staff, speeding up functioning and processes. Air India’s pilots, cabin
executives, aircraft engineers use iPads with Air India proprietary and 3rd
party apps specific to their roles.
•
Executed one of the smoothest and fastest of airline
mergers in the history of aviation of two Full-Service Carriers Air India and erstwhile
Vistara via flawless technology integration. Completed the merger of entire airline
technology landscape of 140+ systems into target state systems in less than one
year whereas typical airline mergers of such scale take several years to
complete. More than 10 million loyalty members, around 300 aircraft and 30,000+
employees were brought together seamlessly.
• Leading the AI revolution in the Airline industry. Global Airline
industry’s first GenAI Virtual Assistant - AI.g was deployed in May 2023, ahead
of any other airline. It has handled 26+ Million queries since launch with an
impressive world-leading containment rate of 97%. 30+
Agentic AI initiatives in progress across the organization transforming Air
India into an Agentic Airline of the future.