January-February 2022 - 31

COVER STORY
Post project completion, the PQS
was deactivated with the idea of reintroducing
it on a larger scale. Lanthier said
GTAA is looking to deploy PQS at other
gates. Initially, PQS was a standalone
application. That could and likely will
change in the future. " We are building
PQS into our overall Departures strategy, "
he said.
And, there are considerations for
more targeted communication. From
an airport perspective, " Concession
revenue is very important, " he said.
GTAA is looking at how it might use
the PQS to increase revenue opportunities,
whether that's sending coupons to a
mobile device or messages to passengers
letting them know they have time to
visit the lounge.
The Tech Behind PQS
The PQS has three components:
* Airline PQS portal - The portal
allows the airline agent at the
gate to login and set up the flight,
select preboarding messages and go
through the boarding process using
a tablet provided at the gate or using
the CUPPS (common use passenger
processing system) workstation.
The airline PQS portal is a cloud
native application developed using
AWS (Amazon Web Services).
* Large display stand and screen at
the gate. Scheduled flight information,
preboarding messages and
current boarding information can
be displayed in real-time based on
the inputs provided to the PQS
portal by the airline agent at the
gate. When not in use for boarding,
the display can show airport
messaging or advertising. Content
management,
scheduling and
the display uses the cloud-based
Omnivex Ink platform and LG's
WebOS platform.
* QR-invoked boarding information
page for mobile devices. Passengers
can scan the QR code available
at strategic locations, including
check in and boarding gate, and
have boarding information on their
mobile device.
One of the reasons GTAA could put
the PQS in place so quickly is it already
had a strategic IT partner. GTAA chose
Wipro as its strategic IT partner in 2016
and signed a 9-year contract.
Anudeep Kambhampati, general
manager - Transportation Sector Canada
with Wipro, said, " If you look at why
Toronto Pearson was able to do a project
like this in the middle of pandemic and
not a lot of airports attempted something
like this, I think that goes back to the
vision they had. They wanted to have
an IT partner like Wipro working with
them to really bring in that organizational
capability to make these kind of
things happen. Airports want to focus
on their core business, and IT is not
their core business. We take care of the
complete IT. "
Wipro took the PQS concept,
brought in partners, and created and
implemented the technical solution.
In the midst of a pandemic, Dipen
Ghetia, innovation program manager
with Wipro, said changes in the aviation
sector were daily, staffing among
the stakeholders was
less and new
government regulations were being
implemented.
Ghetia said the challenge of bringing
stakeholders together was addressed by
showcasing the promise that was there.
" We did not take a traditional project
approach, where usually you spend
months figuring out all the requirements
for the project, " he said. " And then you
spend months developing something.
We didn't have that time or luxury of
investment of effort from everybody. "
Instead, he said Wipro turned the
concept into an IT solution using Agile
methodology, obtained stakeholder feedback,
made updates and implemented the
technology in about 30% of the time a
traditional project might take.
Internally, Wipro was able to fasttrack
the development of the PQS
through a crowdsourcing platform
within the company of almost 230,000
employees, he said.
According to Ghetia, the completely
cloud native and serverless system leveraging
Wipro FullStride Cloud Services,
AWS and Omnivex Ink platform is a
first for Toronto Pearson and uncommon
in North American airports. 
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January-February 2022

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of January-February 2022
