Airports aren’t perhaps the first places that spring to mind when we think of innovation, but there are nonetheless a number of interesting technologies set to come to an airport near you soon.

For instance, researchers at the University of Nebraska have developed concrete that is capable of de-icing itself.  The concrete has a small current running through it that is just strong enough to melt any snow or ice that lands on it, whilst remaining safe enough for us to touch.

Or you have the Norwegian project that uses facial recognition technology to speed up the security process. The technology detects when we enter the airport, and then tracks us through the airport until we’re at the arrivals hall at our destination.

“When a lot of people gather in one place, queues develop quickly,” the researchers say. “Rather than stop every single person at an airport gate, we’ve developed algorithms that recognize people’s faces, based on electronic passports with a photo and ID number.”

There is even a new robot under development that will deal with your baggage for you.  The machine, called Leo, is capable of greeting a passenger as they enter the terminal and then taking care of their luggage for them.  First they weigh each bag, before then printing off the relevant tag, checking the bags in and carrying them to the baggage handling area.

Leo is capable of navigating the airport by itself, avoiding not only the physical aspects of the building but also the passengers.  The aim is to significantly speed up the check-in process.

Innovating at Heathrow

Such innovations are all on the radar of Heathrow Airport, who have teamed up with Cap Gemini recently via their Applied Innovation Exchange (AIE) to ensure they stay on top of developments in their industry.

The aim of the AIE is to enable companies to both see what technologies are emerging in the world, and how these might be then integrated into what the company is doing.

The Heathrow team began their voyage via the AIE in San Francisco, which is one of nine such facilities around the world that Cap Gemini believe offers a global web capable of discovering the latest cool things wherever they may be emerging.

This external perspective is crucial, as many of the innovations mentioned earlier have their origins in other sectors.  For instance, the facial recognition technology is already being used by police in China to identify potential suspects as police vehicles traverse the city.  Or you have ThirdEye, who are taking CCTV footage and using AI to detect criminal behavior.

The baggage handling technology is already being used to deliver everything from packages to pizza, with trials already under way in numerous cities around the world, and researchers from places like Stanford investing heavily in the technology.

Meanwhile similar technology is already deployed in warehouses the world over, with devices like Toro already capable of navigating warehouses and manipulating packages of all sizes.  Or you have the Simbe Robotics device that is doing similar stock management in stores across Japan.

Recombinative

I wrote last year about a new paper exploring the latest trends in innovation, and it revealed a rapid rise in what’s known as recombination.

The researchers trawled through patent records from the US Patent and Trademark Office dating all the way back to 1790.  Each record is codified to classify each patent as a truly new thing or a variation of existing technologies.

The paper reveals that throughout the history of the USPTO, roughly 40 percent of all patents are actually refinements of existing work, with the remainder therefore being novel works.

Where things become interesting however is that this ratio is increasing significantly, with the majority of patents now tagged as recombinations of existing work.

As the saying goes, the future already exists, it just isn’t evenly distributed, and it seems likely that the kind of environments Cap Gemini are trying to produce will only become more common as organizations endeavor to pull in potential innovations from far and wide, and then figure out how these can be tested within their own businesses.