AIRtificial Intelligence is an 48 hours technological marathon that involved start-ups, developers and researchers, with the contribution of Oracle as a technological partner
Intelligence, automation and interconnection: these are the keywords of a revolution that through technology aims to improve and make more efficient work processes on a large scale. An innovation path that focuses in particular on artificial intelligence (AI) to create a technological ecosystem capable of evolving independently under the guidance and supervision of man.
The "AIRtificial Intelligence" initiative of Leonardo and the Italian Air Force, which uses the technological partnership of Oracle, represents a concrete response to the need to approach the main "actors" of the AI - start-ups, developers, researchers and university - to the aeronautical sector, in a logic of open innovation. The primary objective is to immediately experiment and develop the most promising solutions emerged from the hackathon to quickly put avant-garde tools and technologies at the disposal of aeronautical maintenance technicians.
The event developed with an innovative formula: an 48 hours marathon with nine racing teams that challenged each other in the implementation of virtual assistance solutions to optimize maintenance and training interventions applicable to aeronautical systems. These technologies also have a significant impact on environmental sustainability, so much so as to be defined as 'green solutions' for the results they produce in terms of cost cutting and less impact on the ecosystem.
The hackathon, the second organized by the Logistics Command of the Air Force in collaboration with Leonardo after the one in 2018, took place in the Institute of Military Aeronautical Sciences in Florence, a center of excellence for training the leadership of the Armed Force. To evaluate the work of the nine teams, an exceptional jury composed of the AM Logistic Commander, General of the Air Team Giovanni Fantuzzi, the Commander of the AM Schools, General Aurelio Colagrande, the CTIO of Leonardo, Prof. Roberto Cingolani, the Director Scientist of the Italian Institute of Technology, Prof. Giorgio Metta, by Prof. Daniele Nardi of the Department of Computer, Automation and Management Engineering of the University of Rome "Sapienza" and by the Director of the vertical publications of Digital 360 Group, Dr. Mauro Bellini . The presentation of the various projects took place in the presence of the Undersecretary of Defense, Hon. Angelo Tofalo, the President of the Defense Commission of the Chamber of Deputies, Hon. Gianluca Rizzo, and the Chief of Staff of the Air Force, air squad general Alberto Red. Also present were Umberto Panetta, head of Customer Support Services & Training at Leonardo and Alessandro Ippolito, Technology Country Leader of Oracle Italia.
"Initiatives such as those of today - underlined the Chief of Staff of the Air Force, general of the aerial team Alberto Rosso - represent a valuable opportunity to learn, evaluate, share and appreciate ideas and solutions proposed by young talents from start-up up, research centers and Italian universities, worlds with which the armed forces and industry must know how to dialogue in order to share information to develop and increase knowledge, to innovate and to face a future where technology and digitalization continue to evolve into a unicum towards imponderable realities ”.
"Artificial Intelligence is a sector with enormous potential that increasingly pervades our lives", the words of Roberto Cingolani, Leonardo's Chief Technology and Innovation Officer. “AI applications are a great human ally and will outline the future of our planet, also in a sustainable way, provided that an ethical-legal framework is defined that allows people to remain the fulcrum, in a perspective in which both ethics contaminates the digital world and not the opposite ”.
AIRtificial Intelligence is one of the initiatives carried out by the Air Force Logistic Command within a broader process of innovation in various organizational and functional fields, in particular in the "Logistics 4.0" sector. There are two main fields of application identified for this project: maintenance training, which thanks to the use of virtual platforms can be significantly optimized and speeded up, and remote maintenance activities, which through the support of a virtual assistant can find application in particular conditions, such as in operations outside national borders where highly specialized technicians may not always be present in all sectors. These are areas in which the use of artificial intelligence systems applied to predictive maintenance will bring great benefits in the field of flight safety, in particular for the prevention and detection of failures and inefficiencies.
The partnership between Leonardo and Aeronautica Militare aims to grasp the new needs and develop - through the use of enabling technologies such as AI, as well as augmented reality and mixed reality, certified blockchain and big data analysis - solutions that are increasingly at vanguard in the field of Customer Support, Services and Training. Leonardo's goal, in particular, is to expand the portfolio of advanced services and develop suitable solutions for every operational need based on an approach increasingly focused on customer needs.
A decisive contribution came from Oracle, AIRtificial Intelligence's technological partner, which has long been committed to studying and applying Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning technologies in the context of collaborations with which the most modern Cloud solutions are made available - from infrastructures to platforms. up to the application software - with all the technical and consultancy support necessary to reduce human error and improve decision-making and business processes and strategies in light of an ever-increasing amount of data available, thanks also to the Internet of Things and soon to 5G.