As airports race to undertake transformative applied sciences, Miami Worldwide Airport (MIA) is charting a daring path; mixing automation, blended actuality, and human-centred design. Talking forward of his look at World Aviation Festival 2025 in Lisbon, Maurice Jenkins, Chief Innovation Officer IAP C.M. at MIA, revealed the airport’s prime tech funding for 2025: an omni-channel chatbot built-in with interactive holograms.
“You’ll have the ability to converse to a hologram and get real-time airport data without having an app,” stated Jenkins. “Whether or not it’s WhatsApp, Messenger or one thing else, we’re eradicating friction and making it pure. That’s what nice tech ought to do.”
Jenkins might be becoming a member of world aviation leaders at World Aviation Pageant 2025, held from Seventh-Ninth October at Feira Internacional de Lisboa (FIL). The occasion will deliver collectively 6,000 attendees, 600 audio system, and 400 exhibitors, with devoted tracks on AI, sensible airports, digital transformation, and autonomous know-how.
Past tech – creating emotional touchpoints by sensory innovation
Whereas AI dominates headlines, Jenkins says true innovation is as a lot emotional as it’s technological. MIA is exploring sensory branding, together with a signature scent and “Miami drink,” designed to construct a way of place and prolong the passenger expertise past arrival gates. “Whenever you get off the airplane, why rush to baggage declare? Why not keep immersed within the journey?”, he stated.
This method is a part of Jenkins’ broader mission to determine a tradition of innovation that reimagines buyer expertise and repositions the airport as a dynamic, adaptive ecosystem. “Innovation isn’t nearly tech; it’s course of enchancment. It’s cultural shift,” he stated.
Maurice Jenkins
Human-centred automation – robotics, autonomy and belief
From cleansing robots to autonomous lawnmowers, Jenkins is embracing automation, however not on the expense of individuals. “We’re not substituting people; we’re repositioning expertise so as to add extra worth,” he defined. Miami Airport can be working with distributors on plane turnaround analytics and autonomous car testing, drawing inspiration from airfield improvements in Hong Kong and Europe.
On AI, Jenkins stays pragmatic. “Everybody’s chasing the panacea,” he stated. “However we’ve seen actual promise in AI for income optimization and buyer expertise. On the identical time, we’re evaluating the place it may ship tangible operational advantages… not each airport is similar.”
MIA’s tech roadmap contains experiments in parallel actuality and continued partnerships with startups. Jenkins says a few of these are “nonetheless underneath wraps.” However above all, it’s the mindset that issues… “We’re constructing a tradition of innovation. Our executives are backing it. That’s what’s going to change our airport… and the business.”
Maurice Jenkins might be reside on stage in Lisbon as a part of the Good Airports & Innovation observe at World Aviation Pageant 2025.
