COVID-19: Airbus pushes ‘e-delivery’ process

COVID-19: Airbus pushes ‘e-delivery’ process Airbus said it has developed a new virtual “e-Delivery” process for customers wanting to take possession of their new planes without putting their own staff at risk. The company said the new process has already started and will help ensure the company can continue to deliver aircraft “while integrating the required health and safety requirements during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic”. The first customer to adopt the remote end-to-end process is Pegasus Airlines, which recently received three new “e-delivered” A320neo family aircraft. The new approach is made up of three main stages: Technical Acceptance Completion (TAC) tasks delegated to Airbus (or to a local third party appointed by the airline); Electronic Transfer-of-Title (electronic ToT); Ferry-flight and subsequent reception of the aircraft at the customer’s base. For the TAC, which is a prerequisite for ToT, the airline can delegate Airbus to perform on its behalf all the necessary actions. These include the ground-check, the acceptance test flight, acceptance manuals and procedures, as well as minor cosmetic rework if needed. Then for the ToT completion, Airbus’ and customers’ teams can use a collaborative platform called “e-SalesContracts”. This brings them all together – wherever they happen to be – into one real-time virtual environment where they can optimise and simplify all the contractual transactions, from the paperless drafting and commercially negotiating the delivery documents up to the remote ToT digital signature. “This platform thus obviates the need for any of the customer’s own staff to be physically present at the Airbus Delivery Centre,” Airbus said. “After the TAC and ToT formalities are complete, the subsequent ferry-flight is also performed in a manner where the customer’s own flight crew or an appointed third party can pick-up the sanitised aircraft and fly it from the delivery centre to the airline’s home base. Airbus is hoping this new way of doing business will “become the blueprint for Airbus and its customers going forward”. Download the latest issue of Asian Aviation here.