The Air Transport Association of America (ATA) today announced several noteworthy developments from its annual Technical Information Communication Committee (TICC) Forum. The Forum, hosted by Boeing, was held in Long Beach, California from September 22 through 27. The ATA TICC Forum enables airlines, manufacturers, suppliers, software specialists and airworthiness colleagues to meet and advance the application of digital data in aviation. ATA TICC is the international body that establishes voluntary digital data standards for the aviation industry.

The theme of this year’s forum was Advancing Digital Data Exchange in Aviation and was attended by nearly 300 registrants and exhibitors, including 11 international airlines, 12 ATA member airlines and numerous airframe, engine, software and hardware manufacturers and suppliers from around the world.

During the six-day event, areas of advancement included flight operations, maintenance procedures and requirements, graphics, configuration management and electronic text. The forum’s success can be attributed, in part, to these major developments achieved during the week:

- Merger of independent Digital Certification Working Group (DCWG) with the ATA TICC Direct Access and Retrieval (DART) group. The focus of DCWG is to propose air transport standards that provide a secure way to transmit critical data across a public network and ensure integrity of information received and a way for the recipient to verify both the sender and the integrity of the data. The DCWG is now the security sub-group of the DART group and will advise all of the TICC working groups on data-security issues and required ATA iSpec 2200 revisions (information standards for aviation maintenance).
- Agreement by ATA TICC airlines, manufacturers and software providers to establish a digital-data User Issues Working Group (UIWG). A group of airlines, manufacturers and service and software providers are in the process of establishing an aviation digital-data user issues working group. The mission of the group will be to identify shared user issues on the application and use of digital data in aviation. The group will recommend, document and monitor common solutions to these issues.
- Establishment of the Configuration Management Working Group (CMWG) by ATA TICC. The CMWG will recommend and develop standards for the media content, format and structure for airline configuration information. This will enable the operators to use effectivity and configuration information in the digital environment.
The ATA TICC Forum 2003 is scheduled to take place on September 28 through October 4 and will be combined with the new ATA e-Business Forum.
The Air Transport Association is the trade association for leading U.S. airlines and its members transport over 95 percent of all the passenger and cargo traffic in the United States.

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