25 June 2022
SAFIR-Med in World ATM Congress 2022
World ATM Congress is the world’s largest international air traffic management (ATM) exhibition and conference attracting over 6,000 registrants during this recovery year. World ATM Congress is a Civil Air Navigation Services Organisation (CANSO) partnership with the Air Traffic Control Association (ATCA), bringing together the world’s leading product developers, experts, stakeholders, and air navigation service providers (ANSPs).
This year the aviation thought leaders gathered for three days (21-23 June, 2022) in Madrid, Spain, to participate in numerous conference sessions, product demonstrations and launches, contract closures and educational and networking opportunities. The SAFIR-Med project was there with several of the partners participating with e.g. the Droniq corner at a very central DFS booth, as well as Unifly at their booth. Several partners participated life and online, bringing in the spotlight also the SAFIR-Med perspective for the UAM in the European cities.
Helicus presented the SAFIR-Med project and its 17 partners and the collaborating health organisations, making visible the modular components of the partners that can be combined through machine interfaces in a robust fashion. These are evaluated to be robust With Civil Aviation Authority, supported by EASA - European Union Aviation Safety Agency delivering the first EU BVLOS operational authorisation over populated area. It took three years to prepare all documents and go through the whole process for obtaining this type of approval, and SAFIR-Med project proved it can be done, without cutting corners! See also this post on social media for more info.
INVOLI was also represented at the event by its CEO, Manu Lubrano, and its CBO, Olivier Quero, who took the opportunity to present to stakeholders – both from the ATM and the UTM industry – the amazing advancements of the SAFIR-Med project. As such, the company’s involvement in the project was used as an example of what INVOLI’s technology brings to the safety of drone flights and, more generic, how drones can be used to make the world a better place.
The Unifly team demonstrated their UTM solution among many exhibitors from the drone industry that were at WAC this year, which certainly provided the opportunity of a glance to an upcoming future of uncrewed aviation. They also got the chance to meet the UTM market colleagues, as well as to exchange few words with former colleagues from the broad world of ATM.
Droniq participated as part of the DFS Group joint booth and found World ATM Congress to be positive, as things are moving forward in Europe with regulation, especially the U-Space airspaces could be a booster. Otherwise there were the usual good discussions with other ANSPs and potential U-Space operators.
Special thanks to SESAR 3 Joint Undertaking for organizing this event that gave us a lot of insights thanks to the panel discussions and presentations.