Emirates Airline and a number of industry partners have announced a partnership to build the world’s first sector-wide Experimental (X) Lab that will solicit pitches to build a new generation of ultra-modern transport systems.
According to Emirates, the X-Lab at Area 2071 will bring together airlines, manufacturers, ground logistics experts, regulators, engineers, academic and start-ups to “envision a new transportation paradigm and seek solutions that no single organisation or programme has had the resources to deliver on their own.”
Beginning later this year, the Aviation X Lab at Area 2071 will host industry summits to co-create industry shaping challenges, and will the solicit applications from internal and independent engineering teams, academics and startups to address those challenges by working – for a full year – with industry and regulators to ideate new technologies and business theories, conduct experiments and develop prototypes.
Finalists teams from around the world will gather for an annual event each April to pitch their concepts. Winners of the pitch event will then relocate to Dubai the following month along with their government and corporate counterparts to begin a “rigorous curriculum” created in conjunction with the academic and innovation institutions.
Area 2071 was launched by His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai to become the experimental nucleus of the UAE’s Centennial Plan 2071.
“We look forward to the Aviation X-Lab initiative, which will enable Emirates to co-create high impact solutions with our industry partners that will propel the UAE’s aviation sector to new heights, and unlock the possibilities of an interconnected world,” said Sheikh Ahmed bin Saeed Al Maktoum, chairman and CEO, Emirates airline and Group.
Mohammad Abdulla Al Gergawi, Minister of Cabinet Affairs & the Future and chairman of The Executive Office of Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, said that with the Aviation X-Lab “Dubai is further proving itself as the largest X-Lab in the world. We are proud to share our experience with aviation, as home to the world’s international largest airline, with the aviation community.”
Applications for the inaugural Aviation X-Lab will open in November with the first pitches to be presented to the public in April of 2018.
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