ENAIRE selects the winning ideas of its Business Ideas Competition in Air Traffic Management

ENAIRE, the national air navigation service provider, through CRIDA, its Research and Development subsidiary, has received 22 valid ideas in the first edition of the "Business Ideas Competition in Air Traffic Management".

The Selection Committee evaluated all the proposals received and the Jury selected the five ideas that will participate in the development or incubation programme, and which of them will be the three that will receive the cash prizes.

"With these initiatives, ENAIRE will promote turning entrepreneurial ideas into real projects through the Open Innovation concept", says ENAIRE's CEO, Ángel Luis Arias.

"We are looking for talent outside the organisation too, such as in universities and among entrepreneurs in the sector", notes CRIDA's director, José Miguel de Pablo. 

The short-listed ideas were:

First PRIZE - €5,000 + Incubator (3 months)

Idea Name: AEROHUB

Entrepreneur: Javier Diana López (Madrid)

The main purpose of the AEROHUB platform is to offer a system of supply/demand for services with drones in which both operators (individuals or small companies) and future customers who require this type of service can contact each other through the platform, which will serve as a link for everything related to the operation. This will offer benefits to both the service provider and the customer.

As for how to monetise the service, the goal would be to take a small percentage of each operation carried out using the platform, as is currently done by this type of marketplace in other areas of the global economy (AIRBNB, Wallapop, etc.). There would also be the possibility of including ads on the platform or offering secondary B2C (Business to Consumer) services and charging for each of them in the stipulated manner.

SECOND PRIZE - €3,000 + Incubator (3 months)

Idea Name: DRONELYTICS

Entrepreneur: César Gómez Arnaldo (Madrid)

DRONELYTICS proposes a platform that allows information on all drone operations occurring within Spanish airspace, in particular U-space airspace, to be stored and processed using blockchain technology.

This new concept will make it possible to store information securely, relying on the immutability of the data and the possibility of using it in studies or tests with full confidence as to its authenticity, such that if the need arises to determine the details of the operations, they can be accessed from the first moment.

The sources of income that could be considered would be offering this service to the different drone operators to improve their operations, to authorities that need to clear up information in the event of incidents, and the implementation and maintenance of this idea in environments other than Spanish airspace.

THIRD PRIZE - €1,000 + Incubator (3 months)

Idea Name: Detecting Wind Shear at Airports using a Network of Drones

Entrepreneur: Eduardo Sánchez Ayra (Madrid)

The purpose of this system is to create a wind matrix around an airport in real time in order to detect the effects of wind shear in the proximity of the runway thresholds that could affect operations, while respecting at all times the obstacle clearance surfaces in the proximity of the aerodrome through a data link to a hub, which would analyse the information and generate the matrix of winds aloft that could itself detect the effects of wind shear and send alerts to air traffic controllers and crews.

To comply with current legislation and avoid any safety risk to operations, various mitigating measures are proposed: software-controlled hemisphere (geofence) or for example a real hemisphere using a physical barrier (ropes, extensible and retractable elements).

Two main sources of income are identified: one from marketing the product/service to the different interested airports, and the other relies on the existence of the service itself, due to its operation and maintenance, for which a long-term contract will be offered that allows maintaining the commercial link between the supplier and the customer and, in turn, for the platform to be maintained.    

FOURTH PRIZE - Incubator (3 months)

Idea Name: Real-time monitoring of drones

Entrepreneur: José María García Pérez (Oviedo)

The idea seeks to determine in real time the position of drones in airspace and prevent their entry into restricted areas. Drone operators will be able to carry out their activities while knowing where other drones are, and can operate in larger areas. And the air control manager could have this information integrated into its system (SACTA). Through 5G technology, it will be possible to remotely monitor a large number of drones.

There are two types of revenue streams, one of them recurring based on a service subscription, and another transactional when operators use airspace during their activity.

FIFTH PRIZE - Incubator (3 months)

Idea Name: VAiR GATE

Entrepreneur: Jesús Benito López Morreno (Seville)

Engineering consulting and services to develop projects and products that involve the implementation of specialised augmented and virtual reality in the air traffic control and air navigation industry, such as: development of applications that provide visual air navigation support to commercial and recreational aviation pilots, support for HMI models for air traffic controllers consistent with the goal of virtualising remote towers or, for example, more affordable learning options for air traffic controllers.

Revenue would come from the sale of applications and their technological implementation.

Development or incubation of ideas

The five ideas selected will receive personalised support with the aim of shaping both the idea itself and its associated business plan.

The incubation will take place between February and April 2023, and will involve the following activities

- 1 joint videoconference session to explain the methodology used, with a Q&A round.

- 10 hours of individual mentoring by videoconference between each participant and their business mentor in order to prepare the business plan, which will be an evolution of the Business Model Canvas presented in the registration phase.

- Access to the virtual campus, with 24 modules of content on entrepreneurship.

After the incubation phase, the business idea with the best outlook will be selected and awarded a cash prize of 10,000 euros, becoming the winning idea of this inaugural idea competition.

ENAIRE Open Innovation

The Business Ideas Competition in Air Traffic Management is part of ENAIRE's Open Innovation programme. This programme has just selected the 5 finalists for its idea competition. In addition, on 1 February, a competition for technological challenges was launched for research groups, the registration period for which is open until 30 April. In the coming months, an acceleration phase will be launched for startups that present solutions to ENAIRE's business challenges.  

More information at ideas.enaireopeninnovation.com.