KAREN WALKER / PHOENIX
Plummeting airline revenues and reduced capacities combine to end venture
Honeywell has cancelled its software-based Avient venture that was intended to help airlines ease congestion, despite having a launch customer in America West Airlines.
America West, which has just opened a new $33 million flight operations centre in Phoenix, says it had been testing the system and was impressed. It expected to become the launch customer, with phased implementation between now and the end of next year, but was told by Honeywell that the venture was being shut down because of a downturn in demand after the events of 11 September.
"It was Honeywell's call. We were disappointed, but it's understandable in the circumstances," says America West vice-president of operations and control John Wilson. Honeywell confirms it took the decision to cancel Avient as a result of the 11 September terrorist attacks, when it became clear that air traffic congestion issues were no longer a priority in Europe and the USA - viewed as the key markets for the product - and airlines no longer had the budgets for such systems.
Avient was launched as a venture that would have linked data across an airline's operations network and its aircraft to help the airline automatically make the most cost-efficient and time-saving decisions during periods of heavy congestion or weather-related delays.
Before 11 September, there seemed to be a strong market for such a system. But with schedules and capacity slashed by 20-25% and airline revenues plummeting, both the need for Avient and the ability to pay for it disappeared.
Honeywell director of marketing, operations support systems, Norm King admits the company had invested "quite significantly" in Avient and had secured a number of industry partners for the venture. "Unfortunately, the potential market and timing changed after 11 September," he says. "We had done a considerable amount of work on this. We are in the wait-and-see category now to see how the industry will unfold."
Source: Flight International
