BrazilAccenture teams with Changi on in-house innovation centre
Global professional services firm Accenture has helped the operator of Singapore’s Changi Airport to establish a new digital innovation centre.
Changi Airport Group – the operator of Singapore’s Changi Airport, the world’s seventh busiest airport for international traffic – has a new digital innovation centre thanks to the support of global professional services giant Accenture. Known as DIVA, the so-called digital factory has been created to help Changi Airport Group (CAG) in developing and experimenting with new digital products and services from conceptualisation through to go-to-market.
“By establishing DIVA with Accenture, we hope to continue to foster a culture of innovation and experimentation, by injecting new ways of working within our organisation,” said Jeffrey Loke, a senior vice president at CAG. “DIVA is helping CAG implement digital innovations, at speed and at scale, at the enterprise level, serving all CAG departments, including commercial, operations, engineering, IT, and corporate marketing & communications.”
To be managed by Accenture and staffed with a joint team from itself and CAG, DIVA will draw on the latest in emergent technologies such as AI, digital marketing, predictive maintenance, the internet of things (IoT) and big data in an effort to continuously transform operations and enhance passenger experience. Changi already welcomes some 65 million travellers per year, and is due for a massive expansion which will soon add capacity for 50 million more.
“DIVA is enabling CAG to re-evaluate how the airport operates and develop digital solutions to ensure that it remains a world-class leader,” commented Fabio Vacirca, Accenture’s Products unit lead for the Southeast Asia, India, ANZ, Africa and the Middle East. “Picture a start-up environment where employees begin by thinking about what the customer wants and work backwards from there — experimenting rapidly to develop innovative products and services.”
Accordingly, DIVA has been designed in a factory model, with “lines of production, predictable delivery schedules and quality controls.” To date, the collaboration has already seen the development of an AI-powered virtual assistant for airport operations, a predictive maintenance solution for engineering, and next-generation commercial digital marketing campaigns – all powered by Accenture Applied Intelligence solutions and accelerators.
In a press release, Accenture noted Changi’s already impressive resume – including as a ten-time winner of Skytrax’ ‘Best Airport in the World’ award as voted on by more than 40 million passengers across 40 criteria (having now held the crown for seven consecutive years) – with the firm stating that the establishment of DIVA – the first such capability that Accenture has developed in ASEAN – was an important milestone not only CAG but for Singapore as a whole.
