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- Microsoft is working with ACSA to build a centralised services platform.
- This R150-million initiative forms part of a wider tech push at ACSA.
- There are a range of technological developments being worked on to improve the customer experience at airports in South Africa.
- For more stories, visit the Tech and Trends homepage.
Airports Company South Africa (ACSA) is working on a R150-million initiative with Microsoft to create a centralised services platform that will aggregate various services such as flight and hotel bookings and car rentals on a single platform.
This is according to Mthoko Mncwabe, the chief information officer of ACSA, who announced a host of technological developments being implemented at South African airports under their control with the intention of improving user experience.
The predominantly government-owned ACSA owns and operates South Africa’s nine provincial airports, including OR Tambo, Cape Town and King Shaka International Airports.
South Africa’s airport infrastructure amongst the best of any of the categories of infrastructure in the country, according to the South African Institution of Civil Engineering (SAICE) report card for 2022.
SAICE releases a report card once every five years, which grades the state of different categories of infrastructure in the country. Airport infrastructure was placed in the "fit for the future" category, whereas the country’s general infrastructure fell into the "at risk of failure category".
And now ACSA is looking to harness the power of artificial intelligence and robotics in a bid to improve the airport experience in South Africa and to enable self-service functionality more widely.
Mncwabe said ACSA's flagship project was a R150-million initiative with Microsoft, to build a platform that would integrate various customer services into one central platform.
"We are looking to create a platform that will integrate all the various customer services that currently operate in siloes," he said.
"The idea is that multiple services, such as booking a flight, a car or a hotel will be aggregated and accessed through a single platform and user interface."
He said that ACSA was engaging with a number of service providers to build the platform with the goal of making it user friendly and easy to understand.
Biometric border control
ACSA is also working with the Department of Home Affairs in a bid to introduce new security processing systems that use facial recognition capabilities of biometric information that is embedded in a bar code in each passenger's passport.
Speaking to eNCA, Mncwabe said the plan was to start processing passengers using a biometric border control system in and around April next year.
"We are expecting to process a passenger in 30 seconds from when he gets into the gate to when he gets out of the gate."
He said that lines at the border control post were an issue for airports, as it was difficult to manage the number of people that could arrive at the same time if multiple large planes landed at a similar time.
Beefing up cyber security
Mncwabe also said that ACSA had improved its cyber security defences in an effort to stay ahead of cyber criminals.
"Cyber security is always a game of catch-up as hackers are dedicated and committed to constantly finding and exploiting new vulnerabilities. The cyber threat landscape continues to evolve in sophistication and frequency of attack," he said.
“However, in the very least, organisations must ensure that their security systems are robust and up to date in terms of the latest security patches.
