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Istanbul Airport: One of the Biggest of the World

Istanbul Airport has an area of 76.5 million square meters to the north of Istanbul, 35 km away from the city center. At the moment, it has 100 million passenger capacity for the first phase and it is planned to serve more than 300 destinations with an annual capacity of 200 million passengers once it is fully completed. It served 37 millon passengers in 2021 which made it busiest airport in Europe and 14th in the world.

PROBLEM: Why is IoT Needed in Istanbul Airport?
Unlike other airports in Turkey, Istanbul Airport Management Company (IGA) is responsible for every
aspect of the airport operations indoor and outdoor, which means they have to fulfill a very
high-quality service level expectation everywhere in the airport area. Due to this, critical
infrastructures needs to be monitored in a very smart way for better overall service quality, better
operational management and better efficiency with a small and agile team.
Due to fast-pace operational environment, high level of regulatory requirements and intense
competition of airport business, airport company wanted to have a industrial platform technology
which can keep up with the demands of multiple different requirements simultaneously without
adding add-on costs with every different additions to the system.

This required a platform, which needed to have an offer for both frontliners and managers
simultaneously, is easily scalable, can work both indoor and outdoor, can do analytics even with low
data volume, usable for personnel who has no training on digital platforms and can support very
different use cases on single infrastructure.
Because of this requirement, Skysens APM was a perfect fit with its easy to use drag and drop
interfaces, specially designed, wireless, long range network and wide variety of different smart,
battery powered edge devices, managed OT data streams, no code analytics and out of box
integrations, and ready to use applications and services.

SOLUTION: What is Skysens doing in Istanbul Airport and Why is it Important?
Skysens is an official wireless industrial IoT network provider for Istanbul Airport and is currently
operating its large network.
Istanbul Airport is one the first airports in the world implemented a long range wireless I-IoT
network technology with Agile Predictive approach ready for all the technical and operational teams
on the ground.
With help of this capability, thousands of assets are being monitored with plug and play edge devices
and predictively analyzed their performances according to related applications’ requirements securely
without any additional investments.
With this approach, Istanbul Airport had able to create more flexible operational workflow and
improve interdepartmental relationships for airport’s sustainability and efficiency. Also, due to low
cost of adding new data sources to physical environment with Skysens APM, management able to
increase number of the measurement points without big budgets and improve data resolution which
improves situational awareness for every stakeholder drastically.
With Agile Monitoring capabilities, integrating an AI even for a small operational work-flow such as
monitoring a generators for predictive maintenance scheduling, became 5-7x easier to implement in
terms of project time and budget.

Some of the IoT applications listed below are being run on APM in an integrated manner;

Because of agile approach of the Skysens APM, these applications are being done on a single platform for different user levels and integrations to different OT and IT platforms simultaneously without additional investments.

What is the difference between APM and legacy monitoring systems?

Although existing SCADA and other legacy systems are able to cover the basic monitoring needs in
airports, it is impossible to achieve a successful project with a SCADA at the same detail,
comprehensiveness and data resolution level (also project time, cost and ease of integration level) as
an Skysens’s APM platform. SCADA systems are reliable and robust but only have the capability to
support only a specific level due to their rigid nature.
For example, airport maintenance crews can monitor high voltage energy switches which are
distributing the power to multiple consumers. However, it is very expensive and complex to monitor
individual equipment’s current condition, performance, or if send notifications to maintenance crews
with smart, asset-based alarms. Also, even if such an expensive system is being deployed with high
costs, this system will be only related to existing infrastructure and cannot be used for another
monitoring purposes.
For Skysens APM, this question has a very easy answer. In order to monitor energy switches, users
just need to deploy wireless, battery powered low cost temperature sensor and voltage sensor to the
energy panel, and integrate this data flow coming from already deployed Skysens wireless network
to Skysens APM analytics engine. According to outcome, they can easily notify related person or
integrate the results to existing workflows.
With this approach, it makes 8-10X lower cost for adding new asset to analytics platform which
enables very easy, fast-phase decision making process and scalability for the technical teams.
Because of these capabilities, even in early phase of the projects, Istanbul Airport Management
understood the value of the agility of the Skysens APM on the ground to improve Airport’s overall
efficiency and sustainability and extend project scope to airport wide in a short notice.

SOLUTION DETAIL: How Skysens APM Work

Skysens APM works with 4 main elements for Istanbul Airport.

  1. Smart, battery powered, different types of edge devices portfolio; suitable for harsh
    environments and industrial requirements. This edge device portfolio is being provided by
    Skysens and Skysens hardware partners for the Airport’s technical teams according to
    requests on the ground.
  2. Skysens Industrial LoRaWAN Network; which is deployed at the Airport area indoor and
    outdoor. This network is designed for airport requirements such as intense RF signal noise,
    security and high capacity with local and global regulations. All the RF engineering had been
    done by Skysens Integrated Services for different scenarios and network loads.
    Network covers very wide area of Istanbul Airport with its propriety communication technology
    developed for the best performance in industrial areas and is totally compatible with globally
    known LoRaWAN communication protocol. It means Skysens technology uses the major
    advantages of LoRaWAN such as long range of communication ability, low power
    consumption and open low-cost hardware ecosystem. With it, Skysens ensured the future
    compatibility if Airport requires different edge device additions
  3. Skysens APM platform; easy to use industrial analytics platform with features like drag and
    drop dashboard, user based, customizable analytics, industrial data adapters, smart reporting,
    user management and network management tools. Also it works with existing industrial and
    non-industrial platforms Airport is already using.
    Platform enabled managers to manage network and the teams on a single pane, add remove
    new assets, create reports, manage downlinks and firmware updates easily and effectively.
    With its integration capabilities, platform is currently working side by side with existing BMS
    and SCADA platforms as well as ERP systems.
  4. Skysens Services for continues 24/7 support and consultancy for high availability airport
    requires. Skysens also provides physical service support on the field with its project partners
    blue collar workers.

A Necessity: IoT Applications in the Airports

Istanbul Airport Wireless Industrial IoT Project is a great example for other airports and large scale
industrial facilities can benefit from Agile Predictive Monitoring with IoT can be used for different
purposes and how they create additional value.

In order to create more profitable, efficient and sustainable industrial operations at the airports Agile
Predictive Monitoring platform makes a great offer. Please contact now to discuss how Skysens APM
can create value for your operations!

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