By Prof. (Dr.) Dewakar Goel
It’s the most common word in the aviation industry when we talk about MRO unfortunately very few people know about various integracies of these three alphabets.MRO stands for maintenance, repair and overhaul. These are general terms which are in common knowledge and more or less these are self-explanatory for any equipment machine or instrument. Now here in this article my initiative is to talk in detail about various technical aspects of MRO concept, its importance and relevance in the context of aviation sector. Well, for revenue generation point of view I am going to enlarge the scope of MRO which has not been thought about.
Maintenance in the context of aviation can be understood when work is done to ensure that Aircraft is in prime condition and there are no snags or failures observed but still Aircraft is serviced to simply keep the functional readiness.
Repair gives cause of action because thousands of moving parts and software integration in the Aircraft requires repair when instrument panels does not respond as expected or there is engine failure or there are instances of broken windows.
Overhaul isrequired when there is high rate of wear and tear which comes after specific duration of flight operations. In this process, the Aircraft is dismantledpiece by piece and each part is inspected to reassemble.The overhaul needs detailed inspection of surface and internal parts of the Aircraft. We can appreciate that MRO is an activity which is essential to ensure safety and airworthyness of all Aircraftsas per international standards.
Commercial Aircraft marketat Global level
As per statistics available for 2018 the MRO expenditure rose to the tune of US $191 billions which is expected to go up toUS$255 billion by the year 2028. When we talk about India it was US$800 million in 2011 which is increased to US$1.5 billion.
Now comes the questions what are the key factors behind this expenditure on MRO activity? Its basically on account of rise in demand, increase in digitization,updation of digital MRO software which has given rise to technology driving growth in MRO market.If you talk about MRO software market it was US $4.08 billion in 2017 which is expected to rise to US $4.93 billion by the end of 2022.
Technological advancement in MRO
The introduction and implementation of artificial intelligence in todays 4.0 industrial era has made sea change in the concept procedure and practice of MRO activities. It is a game-changing advancement because now we talk about CBM i.e.,condition-basedmaintenance through sensors. Rolls Royce has gone much ahead by introducing bugs like Robots to speed up routine checks. Robotics has come as a great innovative option. The augmented reality technology to meet gap of technicians has come by way of remote guidance by experts onsight and it is non sharing in today’s world. The MRO software has been developed in order to provide end to end solutions.
MRO in Indian context
In our country the major part of our revenue goes in the form of expenditure on MRO because when the question comes for repair of aircrafts, we look for OEM i.e., Original Equipment Manufacturer and we need to go for Boeing and Airbus industries abroad.
For minor maintenance and repair the EASA i.e., European Aviation Safety Agency has approved around 145 MRO centres across the world. In India we have around 8 MRO major players which are identified as AIR India engineering services, Air works India, Deccan Charters, Indamer Aviation, Max MRO, Taj Air, Bird Execution Jet and GMR Aero technique.
There are challenges in this sector which comes as impediment for the growth of MRO activities in India which are mainly due to taxation structure, cumbersomeimportprocedures, movement of exports and inadequate infrastructure.
Growth in aviation sector – A boost to MRO
Inspite of dark phase of two years in Aviation and other sectors across the world due to CORONA Pandemic we got enough time to accelerate the process of introduction and implementation of artificial intelligence. Now we are slowly coming back to the growth in Aviation sector. India is number 3 in the world as regards the domestic passenger traffic is concerend after US and China. However for international passenger traffic, we are number 7. Our planning was to become number 1 in domestic sector and number 3 or 4 in international sector by the year 2027.
India is likely to double its total air passengers in 10 years with around 400 million flyers expected to travel in the country. Today we are having around 700 aircrafts which is going to increase for more than 1200 in 5 years. India saw 140 million domestic and 60 million international passengers which makes total 200 million pre-pandemic. Now with the growthin Aviation sector we should be able to double our passenger traffic. There are tremendous growth opportunities for domestic airlines as mentioned above.
India had400 Aircrafts in 2013-14 which is now 700 Aircrafts and when we look for the orders placed by various Airlines it is going to add atleast 15% more to make 1200 Aircraft fleet in 5 years. Air India takenover by TATA sons will play a major role in coming years because we are going to see merger or acquisition of Vistara and Air Asia with Air India.
We need to talk about increase in number of greenfield and brownfield Airports in the country. In 2013-14 we had 74 Airports and we have added another 67 airports in the last 8 years.If all goes well India is going to have 220 Airports including Heliports and Aerodromes by the year 2026.
Today the Indian Aviation is competing with Indian Railways, the Railways transports over 185 million passengers in first AC and second AC coaches which is going at the rate 5.6% in terms of CAGR i.e., Compound annual growth rate whereasin Civil Aviation we are growing at the rate of 10.3%. The regional connectivity scheme has given rise to Nofrill Airports by way of PPP i.e., Public Private Participation Model. The growth rate of Non-Metro or Regional Airports is much higher than those in Metro cities. The Metro growth rate was around 7.8% during 2010-2015 which is almost the same around 8.9% at the moment.However the growth rate of Non-Metro and Regional Airports has jumped almost 31% from 10.5% during 2010-2015.
Enlarging the Scope of MRO
Recently I addressed two international Aviation conferences where the focus was on MROwhenstakeholders and key players expressed their views. The idea came to my mind as to why we should limit the scope of MRO for Aircrafts only because thousands of other vehicles such as buses, cars, forklifts, tractors, taxis, cleaning equipment, fire-vehicles, jeeps, and other transport vehicles are operating at the Airport. These vehicles also require maintenance,repair and overhaul and for this purpose they are required to send their vehicles to various workshops in and around the city spending on fuel cost, time and energy.
The MRO facility for above vehicles and equipments will be entirely different from the MRO for Aircrafts, therefore we need to provide separate workshops at the airport for these vehicles. It is going to generate huge amount of revenue for the airport operators and it will be great facilitators for all stakeholders operating at the Airport, may be the Airlines and other Agencies and also the passenger and public at large. Finally it goes without saying that indigenisation is necessary for MRO in Aviation so that we need not spend money for going to original equipment manufacturer abroad.
