Speed of Innovation

I once saw an amusing bumper sticker that read: "It’s not just a good idea, it’s the law: 186,287 miles per second."

The message, of course, refers to the speed of light in space. Probably at the wheel of the car was a Trekkie or MIT grad wearing enormous horn-rimmed glasses and a pocket protector in his short-sleeve white shirt.

The speed of product development in avionics gets faster all the time, but it doesn’t adhere to any fixed velocity. Collaborative work environments allow for rapid avionics innovation, but they ensure that participants don’t get carried away in today’s fast-paced environment. The goal is for avionics engineers to move in tandem with their vendors, not ahead of them.

Management gurus have no shortage of buzzwords for the changes that are transforming the landscape of avionics development: rightsizing, reengineering, the virtual workbench. Whatever trendy label you slap on it, it all boils down to helping avionics engineers interact more efficiently. In avionics, the push for economies of scale is being supplanted by the pursuit of flexibility, innovation and speed. Increasingly, the sum of a company’s parts is generating work efficiencies that are greater than the whole.

Looser than a team, but still a distinct set of workers — that’s the Brave ‘Net World of avionics development.

Notable case in point: Harris Corp., an international communications and information technology company, helps aircraft OEMs control the design and creation of avionics components by offering a common interactive development infrastructure. This "groupware" approach ensures each of the vendors contributing to an avionics system produces standardized modules that can be easily integrated.

Increasing numbers of avionics companies are taking this approach, by providing a single point of management for the design and manufacture of all avionics and electronics within an aircraft system. The result is greater avionics affordability and more frequent technology updates.

New avionics technologies envisioned by Boeing, Airbus and other major aircraft OEMs are developing at an exponentially faster rate because of the efficiencies of the Internet-connected workspace. Avionics companies are forging increasingly sophisticated suites of technologies designed to share and manage data in collaborative work environments. The result is an organization of highly productive users who are tied together electronically rather than physically.

These trends surfaced as recurring themes during Aviation Today’s podcasts and Webinars devoted to avionics. Below is a list of our recent avionics-related events that shed light on collaborative engineering workspaces. Webinars

• "Watching from Above: The Growing Demand for Persistent Airborne Surveillance."
• "New Horizons in Radar: The Revolution in Weather Hazard Detection."
• "New Aircraft, New Opportunities: What the OEMs Have in Store for You."

Podcasts

• "How New Avionics Technology is Enhancing Situational Awareness and Increasing Aircraft Value." Interviewees: Andy Biller, Glass Box Project sales; Gary Harpster, Honeywell EPIC sales specialist; Dave Pleskac, Pro Line 21 sales specialist; all at Duncan Aviation.
• "Avionics in The Global Air Space: The Growing Need to Fully Integrate Iridium’s Voice and Data Communications in Today’s Cockpit," Stylian Cocalides, vice president, Avionica.

All of the above podcasts and Webinars are recorded and archived at www.AviationToday.com and are available on demand. Avionics end-users often assume they want the most advanced solution in the cockpit, but let’s face it: what they really want is the best return on their investment. Their choices should be driven by needs and finances, not unrealistic expectations.

Targeted solutions that result in tangible returns — those are the biggest concerns for avionics consumers. For avionics developers, a top priority is to be hard-nosed "solution consultants" who separate genuine innovation from vaporware.