British Airways has unveiled plans for a £7 billion digital transformation project that will see the airline invest over £850 million to modernize IT infrastructure and leverage artificial intelligence (AI).
The project, which involves over 600 separate initiatives, was confirmed at the company’s first “In the Skies” event, and aims to “transform the airline", according to chairman and CEO, Sean Doyle.
“We’re on a journey to a better BA for our people and for our customers, underpinned by a transformation programme that will see us invest £7bn over the next two years to revolutionize our business,” Doyle said.
Core to this journey is the company's heightened focus on AI and cloud technologies, which it said will enable the airline to accelerate efficiency and deliver greater value for staff and customers alike.
It is investing £100 million of the overall figure to achieve this goal, bringing in machine learning, automation, and AI across its operations to make actionable improvements from “bookings to baggage handling.”
These tools will also help the firm to speed up departures and respond to disruptions and are being used to help predict delays, “prompting pre-emptive action” to mitigate against them.
They will also help analyze weather, aircraft capacities, and customer connections data to improve overall staff decision making.
In line with its AI ambitions, British Airways has also announced an investment of £750 million to transform IT infrastructure. It plans to move 700 systems and thousands of servers to the cloud by early 2025.
With these changes comes the promise of new roles in the company, as the airline is creating somewhere in the region of 350 new jobs at Heathrow focused specifically on improving “customer experience at its home and hub airport.”
This includes what the airline described as the “first ever bespoke Microsoft Connected Teams ground-to-air customer care solution”.
British Airways plans customer-facing IT transformation
Part of British Airways’ hefty investment will go into its “digital user experience,” as it rolls out a new website and app designed to offer deeper personalization of results and enhanced self-services.
Under the plans, British Airways said customers will soon be able to "take control” of their journeys and bookings completely online, rather than having to rely on the airline’s customer care centers.
It’ll also be attacking a common boon of the frequent flier by improving aircraft Wi-Fi capabilities.
