Malaysia Airlines announced it will deploy Movement Manager, part of the

Sabre AirOps Suite, for enhanced monitoring and scheduling of its daily

flight operations. The AirOps suite, renowned for its flexibility and

reliability through its open-systems architecture, will play a critical

role in Malaysia Airlines’ integrated operations initiative.

Movement Manager, an automated flight display and movement control system

to be deployed across a client-server architecture using a relational

database, is designed to help streamline flight management, increase

aircraft utilisation and minimise operational disruption.

The implementation of Movement Manager is the first building block in the

construction of Malaysia Airlines’ iOPS integrated operations centre, which

will later include other operational support solutions to physically

integrate several airline functions as well as business applications and

processes. Malaysia Airlines joins a growing number of significant flag

carriers across the Asia/Pacific region, including Air New Zealand, Cathay

Pacific Airways, China Airlines and China Eastern Airlines, that have

deployed products from the AirOps suite for their operations environment.

 

“Integration of schedule planning, ground operations, maintenance, flight

dispatch, flight operations, crew and passenger services, flight tracking,

and service recovery is a growing trend in this industry right now, and we

are leading the field with our iOPS strategy,” said Encik Tajuden Abu

Bakar, senior general manager of technical and ground operations for

Malaysia Airlines. “The AirOps suite is one of the technological solutions

for this mission-critical area as it is built on a robust ‘open,’

non-proprietary architecture. The reason we stress the open-systems

approach is because it has much greater rewards over proprietary technology

infrastructures—it is less expensive, easier for our staff to use,

implement and maintain, saves costs, and can easily integrate with existing

or new technologies.”

 

Cameron Curtis, vice president, Asia Pacific for Sabre Airline Solutions,

said, “Today’s airlines are demanding better visibility and integration of

data between flight operations and ground activities, they want real-time

control and monitoring of their aircraft both in the air and on the ground.

Malaysia Airlines is leading the way in the uptake of this trend through

its iOPS integrated operations centre.”

 

Curtis also noted the importance of the company’s relationship with

Malaysia Airlines.  “We have a strong relationship with Malaysia Airlines

through its current use of Sabre AirFlite Planning and Scheduling Suite and

the Sabre AirMax Revenue Management Suite, which drive efficiencies and

cost reductions throughout the airline’s operations. Movement Manager will

form the foundation of Malaysia Airlines’ flight operations initiative, and

we are looking forward to continuing to work in close partnership with the

airline to deliver a world-class system for automating flight operations,

dispatch and ground management functions.”

 

By working on an industry average delay cost of $70 per minute, an airline

with 500 movements per day can realise potential savings of several million

dollars per annum by avoiding only one minute of delay per flight, on

average. Maintenance yields can also be improved by up to one percent by

optimal aircraft tail assignments in the operations window.

 

“Movement Manager provides the potential for Malaysia Airlines to achieve

significant savings through automation, visibility and integration,” Curtis

said. Sabre Airline Solutions has responded to the increased activity in

Asia Pacific by opening a new office in Kuala Lumpur and appointing Bobby

Lai regional director.  “It is exciting for us to have this critical

regional resource based in Malaysia, and we look forward to continuing to

build our presence in the region under the strategic direction of Bobby

Lai,” Curtis said.
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