Airline industry is one of the industries highly
relating to hotel industry. In this
final project, it will further investigate how cloud technology applies in
airline industry and leading the success under globalization.
Why to use cloud technology in airline industry
Cloud computing has features including scalability
and on-demand services with huge storage space, lower up-front investment cost
and easy to be accessed with different electronic devices (Furht & Escalante, 2010). On the other hand, the business of airline
industry is to provide services for transporting customers to different places. With decreasing ticket prices income and
increasing operating costs and competition between companies, airline companies
need to stand out from their competitors by differentiating their services in
terms of quality and efficiency.
In terms of product differentiation, airline companies
implement cloud computing at different stages for different tasks and different
stakeholders. For instance, staffs can
share information by cloud server or use wed base applications for daily
operations. Customers can make booking
through online systems. Common platform can be built to work with suppliers and
even airlines can connect with International Air Transport Aviation (IATA)
through cloud server to advance the black box status.
In one sense, cloud technology works closely with
airline industry in order to enhance the efficiency and service quality.
Globalization opportunities for airline industry
According to BBC News definition, globalization is
the process of increasing trading activities and cultural exchange around the
world. In fact, it induces opportunities
like alliance and collaboration between corporates, cost reduction by
outsourcing jobs, increase communication and therefore information sharing, and
even culture change with individuals habits.
² Corporate alliance and B2B collaboration
Globalization reshaped the aviation industry by
boosting alliance between airlines. With
the technology improvement, people are easier to travel between countries with
less time and costs. To ensure the
business opportunity and profitability, airlines like Turkish Airlines formed
alliance in order to expand their business (Kocer & Semercioz, 2008). Through the partnership with other airlines,
they can increase the coverage internationally for more income. For operation side, it is supported by IT
system integration and setting up single office with using cloud base
technology.
On the other hand, B2B collaboration is another
opportunity for airlines down the supply chain.
Apart from their own loyalty program to lock in customers, airlines can
cooperate with other corporates to bundle services.
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² Outsource jobs to offshore
Cloud server allows users to access it anywhere,
anytime. In one hand, globalization
enables corporate to earn foreign currencies as the business become
international. On the other hand, they seek
ways to reduce operating costs when running the business. They tend to outsource back office duties to
countries with lower
administration expenses and labour costs. Even though the offices are located in
different time zones, local staffs can still operate and ensure the data be
ready although the overseas branches are off the hour by the time.
² Information sharing
With the aid of internet, communication and
information sharing becomes easy and fast.
For external customers, airlines can make different kinds of promotion
through web 2.0 or even create cloud base booking systems for self-help
reservation. For internal users, staffs
can share useful data even they are in different places. More importantly, this information sharing
enables managements to make decisions or responds efficiently without
physically sitting at the site. For
example, management can review overseas economic conditions to judge the
investment opportunities there.
² Culture change
Furthermore, globalization beats the geographic
limitation and increase ones travelling frequency. It becomes affordable for consumers to travel
overseas. In daily life, people are more
willing to try import products for which the prices were higher in decades
ago. With more exports and imports,
freight incomes for airlines climb up.
New knowledge management
The objective for corporates to management
knowledge is to effectively and efficiently manage the existence organization
knowledge and “mobilizing personal knowledge to achieve organizational goals”. It includes managing for both substance and
processes (Gao, Li, & Clarke, 2008). It is kind of waste
if the corporate keeps many useful information at cloud server but no one can
make good use of it, which means the feature of cloud technology cannot be
fully utilized and stops converting and transferring to intangible asset.
In fact, knowledge management can facilitate decision
making capabilities, build learning path throughout the organization and even
stimulate innovation (Quast, 2012). With more information provided, people try to
compare and look for further process improvement. Additionally, they are trained to share
information which helps to improve work efficiency and eventually change the organization
culture.
How to manage knowledge by cloud technology
Cloud computing provides centralize platform to
store the data. For external
stakeholders such as customers, they make online reservation for air tickets.
By the time, information like seats availability, passenger special requests and
even age distribution are stored at cloud server. In terms of internal knowledge usage, staffs
can access the server and download the data for their own use. Frontline staffs base on those data to
prepare and serve those passengers with special needs. For examples, more special meals is needed if
there are vegetarians, small gifts are presented for kids, and even wheelchairs
needed to be ready for elders. On the
other hand, back office finance team members use the price related data to forecast
profitability. In one sense, every
purchased ticket is transformed and transferred to different users for their interpretation
and use.
Actually, different people have different experience
and interpretation even with the same piece of data. Although they have the same operating manual
on hand, the outcome will be different if user’s background or personality is
different. By communication and
exchanging information and ideas, knowledge is transmitted broadly (Khoshnevis & Rabeifar, 2012). In the bright side, they may learn from one
and other to improve work effectiveness.
Eventually, the organization culture can be changed.
Innovation practice for Lufthansa
Technik AG
(LHT)
Deutsche Lufthansa AG as the sole shareholder of
the group is the world biggest aviation group.
It introduced an innovation practice named Lean Production System in
2002. It invested and aimed at improving
workforce qualification, better resources management and work efficiency optimization
by training academy and continuous education.
The project started by hiring external consultants to change and modify
internal process to become value-added process.
Once the target achieved, they look for continuous improvement in order
to be sustainable. Meanwhile, extensive
trainings and team-building activities were provided to staffs. Through intensive communications and
cooperation, employees were motivated and the organization culture changed. (McIvor, O’Reilly,
& Ponsonby, 2003)
Conclusion
Nowadays, cloud technology can be applied
extensively to different industry. Its
usefulness does not only limit to its advance technical feature, but helps to manage
intangible assets and change the organization culture. If a corporate makes good use of it and apply
to innovative practice, it can achieve cost effectiveness and stand out at the
globalized economic environment.
Reference:
Furht, B., & Escalante, A. (2010). Handbook of
Cloud Computing. Springer.
Gao, F., Li, M., & Clarke, S. (2008). Knowledge,
management, and knowledge management in business operations. Journal of
Knowledge Management, 3-17.
Khoshnevis, S., & Rabeifar, F. (Jul, 2012). Toward
Knowledge Management as a Service in Cloud-Based Environments. International
Journal of Mechatronics, Electrical and Computer Technology, 88-110.
Kocer, B., & Semercioz, F. (2008). Strategic Alliances in
the Aviation Industry: An Analysis. Journal of Transnational Management
Development, 29-45.
McIvor, R., O’Reilly, D., & Ponsonby, S. (2003). The
impact of Internet technologies on the airline industry: current strategies and
future developments. Strategic Change, 31-47.
Quast, L. (2012, August 8). Why Knowledge Management Is
Important To The Success Of Your Company. Retrieved from Forbes:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/lisaquast/2012/08/20/why-knowledge-management-is-important-to-the-success-of-your-company/
Globalisation. (2014, January 1).
Retrieved April 28, 2015, from http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/gcsebitesize/geography/globalisation/globalisation_rev2.shtml
(2015, January 1).
Retrieved April 17, 2015, from
https://www.rickscloud.com/how-cloud-computing-could-help-the-aviation-industry
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