The digitalisation path undertaken at a global level by Leonardo has already brought concrete visible benefits to the Lombardy region. At the factories in the province of Varese, the company has created two modern, technological and immersive environments that express the state of the art in the group’s digitalisation process.
In Venegono Superiore (Varese) Leonardo develops the most advanced training aircraft on the market, the M-345 and the M-346, but also the simulators that form the sophisticated Ground Based Training System, the virtual part of the training path of military pilots of next generation fighters. Big data and supercomputing completely change the paradigm, allowing the “real” elements of the scenario to be merged with the “virtual” ones, reproducing environments and operational missions that were unthinkable a short time ago.
Live, Virtual & Constructive simulation technology thus integrates real and virtual in a single digital and immersive environment. But that’s not all: a completely digitalized environment can integrate a complete training structure, manage the planning of training missions, lessons and evaluation processes, but also the maintenance and readiness of the fleet, making use of predictive maintenance capabilities. The benefits deriving from this highly digitalized training system are notable: in addition to the higher level of skills transferred to pilots and the unlimited number of operational scenarios on which to train them, the “real” flight hours are reduced and with them the costs and the environmental and acoustic impact.
A further implication generated by Leonardo’s hi-tech push in the Varese area is present in the Sesto Calende helicopter factory, at the Diagnostic Services Tower, a real strategic hub that synthesizes and processes the flight data of 1,300 helicopters of the 4,500 in service in the fleet Leonardo. The environment is integrated and supported by Leonardo’s supercomputer, the davinci-1: the mind where all the helicopter data is stored and the central brain capable of processing it at up to 5 million billion operations per second. Thanks to this data and computing power it is possible to formulate advanced analysis models to support the helicopter’s monitoring, diagnostics and prognostics activities. These models are used by Leonardo, for example, to analyze any discrepancies between the actual behavior of a real helicopter in flight and what should instead be its optimal condition. By verifying these differences, it is possible to intervene immediately to increase the performance of the helicopters, carry out preventive maintenance and improve the life cycle of the product and its components, as well as the spare parts procurement process, with benefits both in the engineering and maintenance phases. use, in the name of high safety and sustainability standards.
Thanks to sharing and extrapolating value from data, Leonardo is therefore able to elevate its services, increasing the overall benefit for customers.