Mercator, a leader in aviation IT solutions, and United Airlines (UA), a major cargo carrier, have joined forces to migrate the airline’s cargo logistics and revenue accounting systems to Mercator’s SkyChain and Rapid Cargo solutions.

It has created one of the largest cargo IT solutions in the airline industry, a statement said.

The migration has helped United Airlines move away from around 20 legacy systems, saving millions of dollars in operational costs. The airline expects to have over two million bookings and 1.5 million air waybills every year on its more than 6,000 daily flights with over 700 aircraft that fly to 10 major hubs and over 400 airports worldwide.

“With the end customer in mind, streamlining processes and enabling significant cost savings are critical when shaping future air cargo technology. It means much more than simply moving goods from origin to destination. While the global industry grows, and the world becomes better connected, we strive to put our aviation expertise to our customer’s service,” said Mukund Srinivasan, vice president Mercator.

“The partnership between Mercator and United created and deployed a UC360° system that is the foundation for the future optimization of United Cargo’s products, processes and technology. Managing our cargo operations and revenue accounting with the proven, industry-leading SkyChain and Rapid platforms transformed our technology from outdated to next-generation in a single step,” said Robbie Anderson, president United Cargo.

“At United Cargo, we’re very excited about future developments in the areas of e-commerce, communications and customer relationship management, because now we have a system that accommodates these advancements in a way that sets us apart from our competitors,” he added.

As United Cargo’s IT partner supporting over 20,000 users and 4,500 web customers, Mercator significantly enhanced SkyChain and Rapid to improve mandatory requirements for the North American market, which serves as a solid base for United Cargo’s expected growth.

Such improvements include new features for six Customs authorities – US, UK, Nigeria, Korea, Mexico and Canada – of which UK and US are directly interfaced with SkyChain.

Other key features include Quick Pak functionality for small packages, customisation for the Cargo Portal Service (CPS), interaction with United’s Bag Tag System (BDS), and inclusion of Transportation Security Administration (TSA) requirements. This evolution for United also included significant enhancements to streamlining IT systems and processes for a more efficient cargo operation.

For the past ten years, global air cargo traffic has grown 3.7 per cent per year. Long-term projected economic and international trade growth, the continuing globalisation of industry, increasing adoption of inventory reduction strategies, and on-going renewal of the world freighter fleet are set to steer the world air cargo market to grow approximately 5.2 per cent per year.

North American air traffic is projected to average 2.3 per cent growth over the next 10 years and to sustain that rate over the full 20-year forecast period.

Mercator, part of the Emirates Group, with offices in Dubai and Bangkok, powers the IT systems of 130 plus airlines in 80 countries across six continents.

United Airlines and United Express operate an average of 5,446 flights a day to more than 370 airports across six continents. – TradeArabia News Service