A programme to foster innovation created by Airbus and the Aerospace Valley industry R&D cluster in France’s Aquitaine and Midi-Pyrénées regions has selected a group of four projects to support, following a 2014 call for ideas that attracted 59 applications.
The partners called for ideas from small-to-medium sized companies across Europe that were designed to reduce aircraft noise, CO2 emissions or fuel consumption in civil aviation, or to contribute to the eco-performance and efficiency of the cabin as well as in the development of alternative energies. For the winners, there will be help in searching for funding and technological partnerships, and direct help from Airbus experts.
Selected were an innovative de-icing concept from ISAE/INSA, an ONERA study on the influence of jet fuel composition, a VESO concept for biomaterials in cabin interiors and, from Innov’ATM, an insect behaviour-inspired approach to airport ground movement optimisation.
Said Agnès Paillard, president of the 757-member Aerospace Valley cluster: “We are convinced that the selected ideas bring interesting concepts to environmental challenges of civil aviation. Aerospace Valley will therefore support these contributors by helping them to mature their concept and to transform these ideas into concrete projects or products.”
Airbus chief innovation officer Yann Barbaux added: “This contest is one of the initiatives we began to open Airbus to external ideas coming from our eco-system and in particular from small companies. The call for ideas was a real success with regard to both the number of applications and the quality of the proposals.
“We’ll make sure that the winning projects will be closely followed-up by our teams.”
Source: Flight International
