2025 Agenda

There is more than 5000 VHF stations globally deployed gradually since 1984. These stations enable +80% of global datalink communication between aircraft and ground. Each VHF station if upgraded (to VDL-2) can pass the amount of 31 kilo bit per second. While datalink is essential to aviation, there are a few early indications that this throughput might not be enough for the emerging use cases such as Trajectory-based Operations and command and control of Remotely piloted AAM (drones and air taxis). These use cases create a need for a new type of communication that allows streaming high volume of data constantly from the aircraft. We believe Hyperconnected ATM concept offers a technical solution for these use cases. “Hyperconnected ATM” is a aeronautical communication concept whereby non-safety “off the-shelf” air-ground links that are available in an aircraft could be used in addition to safety links (e.g., VDL-2) to support safety communications. Among the benefits of this design is the global and immediate availability of the radio infrastructure, cost effectiveness and high performance (1000 times more throughput than VHF). Among the challenges are those associated with public internet; cyber security, certification, and safety requirements. Our presentation will focus on discussing SITA’s hyperconnected ATM based solution for AAM industry. We will review our design and demo one of the key components that we have prototyped (“ a quality of service” application). This presentation will be useful for AAM operators and manufacturers to understand how Hyperconnected ATM concept can provide them with a solution that is more reliable than the current available options. The presentation will also be interesting to airlines and ANSPs to see how their emerging communication needs are not very different from those of the AAM and how Hyperconnected ATM solutions already being developed for AAM ecosystem.