President, Europe, SITA (Société Internationale de Télécommunications Aéronautiques)
Sergio Colella (SITA Europe) : Le premier vertiport européen est lancé en Île-de-France
Ce mardi 14 juin, Sergio Colella, président de SITA Europe, est revenu sur le lancement du premier vertiport européen pour des avions électriques ou taxis volants en Île-de-France, dans l'émission Good Morning Business présentée par Sandra Gandoin et Christophe Jakubyszyn. Good Morning Business est à voir ou écouter du lundi au vendredi sur BFM Business. 👋 Bienvenue sur la chaîne YouTube officielle de BFM Business, première chaîne d'information économique et financière de France.
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Transcript (16 segments)
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Interviewer0:09
Good morning, Business. It's 7:19. With us is Sergio Colella, President of SITA Europe, the Société Internationale de Télécommunications Aéronautiques. Good morning.
You're with us this morning to announce the launch of Europe's first vertiport, a port for flying taxis in the Île-de-France region. That's a lot of new words in a single sentence, Sergio. Please explain to us what this is about and what the timeline is for these flying taxis in Paris.
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Sergio Colella0:39
The vertiport is indeed new. It's a new type of infrastructure—an airport for aircraft with vertical takeoff and landing, electric aircraft you could say: flying taxis, flying drones.
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Interviewer0:55
Not helicopters, right?
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Sergio Colella0:57
Not helicopters, not aircraft with thermal engines. These are electric motors, much more maneuverable, much more adaptable—a concept designed for urban travel. Much quieter. Technology has evolved to make these electric aircraft a reality, little by little. They are reality today.
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Interviewer1:23
You're building a vertiport, with the aircraft behind us—these drones, these flying taxis. It's a totally new sector. When do they become commercially viable?
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Sergio Colella1:32
The goal is commercial viability by 2030. The first experiments are happening now, including the vertiport experiment at Pontoise, which aims to have first test flights during winter 2022 and to be ready for the 2024 Olympic Games. Everything is new—the nature of travel, the movement of athletes during the Games. There's a mandate to ensure athlete transport, and the idea is to test the uses of this new type of aviation: low-altitude flying, 100 to 300 meters of altitude, and to also test the acceptability of this new mode of transport.
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Interviewer2:17
More than 150 companies in the world are developing, building, and operating flying taxis. You're going to manage the entire customer experience around these flying taxis?
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Sergio Colella2:30
Absolutely. We're announcing a partnership today with Skyports, which is the vertiport operator. SITA will manage the entire passenger experience: booking a ticket, checking in, entering the vertiport—all of this is new. We'll use mobility technologies from a smartphone, biometrics for recognition, so our boarding pass is our face. We'll also manage all the operations and management of the eVTOL aircraft in the vertiport.
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Interviewer3:11
Since you're here, and Coup de Vent Business is here for the inauguration—SITA is a historic operator, you manage airports around the world, data is the key, you're a service provider for all airlines and airports. So we'd like to ask you this morning: how is air transport doing today? We're on June 14th, I believe.
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Sergio Colella3:41
Much better. I recall that a year ago I said we were in the depths of crisis. Today, compared to last year, we have three times more passengers in Europe than in April and May 2021. It's an enormous increase. It's not yet at 2019 levels—we're at about 85% of the 2019 passenger level in Europe—but it's already considerable growth. Revenue is returning faster.
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Interviewer4:08
Revenue is returning faster, but this also generates other challenges, including airport congestion, which is an important issue. There are also security problems with passenger arrival and handling, as flows become increasingly massive. Digitalization was supposed to make all this easier.
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Sergio Colella4:31
Absolutely. The best way to manage congestion is not to triple the size of airports, which is of course impossible, but to digitalize the entire passenger journey. We have two challenges ahead of us. First, airport infrastructure needs to recruit—to take the example of Heathrow, Europe's largest airport, they have a recruitment plan for 30,000 people. Here at Paris airports, 4,500 people need to ensure full operations after two years of reduced activity. The second challenge is to completely digitalize the passenger experience and all passenger flow processing. This technology is ready: biometrics, artificial intelligence, mobile technology—so that the mobile phone in everyone's pocket becomes the remote control of our journey, and our boarding pass is our face. We're advanced in deploying this technology, which should help smooth the flow.
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Interviewer5:35
But will we be ready for this summer, or will my airport crack when summer arrives?
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Sergio Colella5:40
Probably difficult, given the many reasons. However, a certain number of technologies are already in place, and there's a real willingness to make sure the summer goes well. We expect a traffic peak at the largest European airports, which will be very significant. The idea is to get through the summer and also to continue, because we expect that—barring any reversal of the situation—air traffic will continue to grow. This is both an opportunity and a challenge, because we must adapt to ever-increasing demand.
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Interviewer6:17
Thank you, Sergio Colella, President of SITA Europe. In less than an hour, it will be Ben Smith, the CEO of Air France-KLM, who will take over Good Morning Business, because Marc is with us this morning. Thank you.