Josep Tarradellas Barcelona-El Prat Airport staged a Demo Day at the end of last month for five start-ups to showcase the viability of their customer experience solutions in an airport environment. A total of 254 projects were entered into the challenge with applicants applying from 33 different countries around the world.
Prior to demonstrating their ideas the start-ups were guided by mentors from the Spanish airport operator, Aena, throughout a six-month process, to shape their ideas based on five areas specified in the programme: passenger communication, airport sustainability, passenger experience, baggage handling and travel to the airport.
The winning projects will be eligible to apply for a contract with Aena worth up up to €2 million to implement the entire project throughout Aena’s facilities.
The five start-ups included:
Airbot, which launched a conversation app that offers answers to questions from passengers. The multilingual agent can communicate in Spanish, Catalan and English and would be added to the Aena website and app.
Meanwhile, Carwatt carried out a project involving decarbonisation in airport mobility by converting diesel combustion vehicles to fully electric vehicles, using reusable batteries and components.
Chinespain launched “Hi China!”, an app for Chinese passengers with all the information of interest in their language on the airports of Barcelona and Madrid; online booking and payment through their platforms (Webchat and Alipay).
Dubz presented its Baggage as a whole project. The innovative service collects baggage from anywhere in the city of Barcelona as specified by the passenger and checks it. All the passenger has to do is claim it at the destination airport.
Finally, the company Meep developed ‘Aena Mobility’ – the first Mobility as a Service (MaaS) that connects a city’s mobility, by integrating different means of transport on a single platform, with the indoor guide at Barcelona-El Prat Airport, as well as with updated flight information.
