The market
The global air freight market in 2011 was an industry estimated at $ 57 billion, ranging from planes dedicated to the transport of fresh flowers to Formula 1 cars for the next race. The air freight sector, measured by tonne-kilometer (RTK), represents $ 167 billion, compared to 60 thousand billion RTK dollars for maritime freight. The commercial value of the shipped goods reaches 2.7 thousand billion dollars. In the past decade, soldiers have more and more needed to quickly send increasing quantities of emergency supplies, tank and even food and fuel in areas where infrastructure is inadequate, even non -existent. This is not part of the turnover, but according to some initiates, it could easily reach $ 20 billion a year, or more with long missions in Afghanistan and Iraq. Regular services provide 4.5 million tonnes of weekly freight capacity which are available in more than 3,400 airports in 220 countries, while Charter and Express companies provide additional capacity. World air freight traffic should triple over the next 20 years, from 2009, the worst year for a decade. This implies an average annual growth rate of 5.9 %. The intra-Asian market increased by 7.9 % per year, and the Chinese domestic segment experienced growth of 9.2 %. The number of freight fleet aircraft will increase by more than two thirds over the same period, from 1,755 planes in 2009 to 2,967 in 2029. Freight revenues represent an average of 15 percent of airline revenues, With the exception of a gain of up to 50 percent. One tonne of cargo per ship costs a commercial carrier between six and ten hundred per tonne and a thousand (tone mile). A ship will take two to three weeks to get from China to the west coast of the United States. An aerial cargo 747 can go around the world in less than a day, but the cost is fifty to sixty hundred per ton-mile, at least ten times more than by boat. Within air freight, international express expeditions increased from 4.1 % of total freight traffic in 1992 to 12.8 % in 2008, average size per shipment being approximately 5 kg. Express service providers offer door -to -door services incorporating the traditional airline, forwarder and handler coalition that was inspired by the traditional logic of business core business. Since each actor must maximize his own operations, no one optimizes the entire system. This allowed these small packages delivered through a set of integrated services to come. Fedex is today the largest air freight carrier in the world with 692 planes, followed by UPS, Korean Air and Emirates. Lufthansa, the first European carrier, is number 12 in the world. Five Chinese airlines surpass the German flagship.
Innovation
The question of fuels was raised in the maritime transport industry (case 72). The fuel is very clean compared to the fuel of ships, but it consumes more by ton-mile shipped. The first objective is to reduce fuel consumption by moving to more effective planes. In 2010, airlines spent $ 139 billion on fuel, $ 14 billion more than in 2009. This improves the yield of those who can afford capital investment. But, as these planes will not be removed from the world fleet, ineffective consumption will be transferred to less competitive actors. Fedex aspires that biofuels represent 30 % of the company's carburetor by 2030. In the meantime, the new sorting center of Cologne Bonn airport has solar panels on the roof which produce 800 MWh per year . The main challenge remains that the world transport of goods, by air or maritime, continues to demand massive infrastructure which depend on the mortar and fossil fuels for the decades to come. Alex Hall grew up in the United Kingdom, dreaming of becoming an astronaut. Unfortunately, genetics was not on her side when she learned that she was too small to even learn to become a professional pilot. She lived near the hangars of the Cardington airship in Bedford. These huge hangars inspired his fascination for oversized planes and the history of airships, in particular the trans-worlds of the Graf Zeppelin. A graduate in astrophysics from the University of Leicester, she had a career in the reception centers of visitors related to the space, first for six years at the British National Space Center in Leicester, then as Executive Director of the Chabot Space and Science Center in Oakland in California. When his fiancé Brian stole in in July 2006 the new Zeppelin produced in Germany by ZLT (Zeppelin LuftSchifftechnik), he joined Alex who developed the strategy jointly and wrote the business plan to bring the Airse Zeppelin to the United States for The first time since 1937. An airship's purchase agreement was concluded with the German manufacturer in February 2007 through its new AIRSHIP Ventures company. The first thing to do was find a base for the Zeppelin. Fortunately, three of the 13 hangars of original airships in the United States are located in California. Esther Dyson, a former Wall Street technological analyst, is committed as the first providential investor and in March 2008, the company was fully funded. The main challenge was to rewrite the laws on airships in America since they were approved for advertising airships, not for passengers or freight carrying Zeppelins. The first passengers went on board in the fall of 2008, marking an surprisingly rapid turning point in an initiative that many considered if not impossible, at least slow and complex. Alex and his team spoke to them.
The first cash flow
The first cash flow was generated by the sale of circuits "tourist flights" above the bay of San Francisco, Silicon Valley, San Diego and Los Angeles. The airship is also rented for scientific research at NASA, Woods Hole Institute and television channels who wish to use it as a platform for the Golden Globes, PGA Golf and Rose Bowl. The revenues generated progress in accordance with the plan and Airship Ventures plans to develop with additional airships on the East Coast. A second source of income should come from training and education in flight, the establishment of a professional school piloting school and research and development on airships. Alex may not have managed to become an astronaut, but she deployed his visionary, creative and entrepreneurial talent to make an idea materialize. In July 2011, she had the opportunity to become the main director of Google Lunar X-Prze, hoping that day she could still go to the moon.
The opportunity
Now that Alex and Brian had proven their business model in the airships, several other initiatives have emerged. Aviation Capital was created by the risk capital investor Kirk Purdy in Calgary, Alberta (Canada) in 2009. He signed an agreement with Lockheed Martin to market their cargo airships made in Palmdale, California. By 2013, Aviation Capital could transport a hundred tonnes of freight per flight to northern Canada distant with an airship the size of a football field and practically no need for landing infrastructure. Bob Boyd, director of the hybrid program at Lockheed Martin, is convinced that by 2016, an airship of three football fields will be able to transport 450 tonnes of goods on a trip. Although Lockheed Martin reserves the right to all military applications that are larger than civil applications, Aviation Capital has an exclusivity on the freight market. The current airship technology makes it possible to deliver goods to 25 cents per ton-mile, which corresponds to the cost of air freight, while doubling or tripling the cost of maritime shipments. However, if we calculate the total cost, in particular the infrastructure, we realize that the airships are today the least capital, the most versatile and the most economical fuel transport system. The airship does not need an landing track or quays on the high seas. The elimination of these invasive, polluting and often noisy concentrations of transport infrastructure makes the airship a very competitive means of transport. As airships take off and land like a helicopter, you just have to have a mooring (mobile) mooring truck or a pole, and a mooring circle depending on the size of the airship. The previous experiences of the airship of Paolo Lugari (Case 15) in Las Gaviotas (Colombia) with its airships for the control of shots, or the airship used by De Beers for mining exploration in Botswana, have demonstrated the wide range of applications possible beyond freight. A new means of transport for people and goods, which does not require any major infrastructure, is energy efficient and competitive, while changing the rules of the game, and which meets the conditions of the blue economy.
