Over a period of less than four weeks, it mobilised creative talent around the world, with more than 300 applications sent in from 31 countries. Out of a shortlist of six, three winners have been chosen.

“The Ile-de-France region has committed to an ambitious plan which will relaunch its economy. To help the airport industry bounce back as rapidly as possible, the region would like to reassure its international partners that its transport infrastructure is safe for public health. That is the aim behind our initiative, which demonstrates both our operational capabilities and our willingness to work with partners so that we can rapidly respond to the challenges posed by present circumstances. Innovation is a major part of our relaunch plan, so we have made it central to the initiative,” says president of the Ile-de-France regional authority Valérie Pécresse.

The Groupe ADP’s chairman and CEO Augustin de Romanet has announced that “we have been working with all our partners for several weeks to set up an ecosystem our passengers can trust, based in ideal public health conditions for our airports. This challenge has inspired new ideas and given us fresh solutions to roll out. With this initiative, the Groupe ADP would like to re-establish connections, tourism and economic dynamism as rapidly as possible.”

The young entrepreneurial applicants’ solutions are consistently well-developed, and they adapt or sometimes even reinvent technology to overcome new health challenges.

The winners selected by the panel for each of the three categories are:

• For the Prevention category (151 entrants)

CASPR (USA): Natural air and surface disinfection technology that transforms oxygen and humidity in order to continually destroy pathogens while public infrastructure is in operation 

• For the Detection category (90 entrants)

RUBIX S&I (France): multi-sensory, multi-purpose sensors that have, among other features, the ability to analyse how frequently and for how long spaces should be disinfected or cleaned by detecting odours and micro-particles

• The New Services category: (68 entrants)

Vivoka (France): a voice control solution that can be installed across various stages in the passenger journey and at all interfaces

Shortlisted start-up Outsight (France) was also highly commended, and the Ide-de-France regional authority and Groupe ADP are looking forward to working with it further and applying its technology to meet public health challenges.

These very promising technologies will enable us to target the highest level of public health security during journeys which exemplify the Groupe ADP’s commitments to its passengers, namely quality service and smooth, simple journeys.

Three major trends emerged from the application pool:

• Airports which apply new health standards while ensuring passenger journeys remain uncomplicated by monitoring social distancing and facemask use in real time and by using UV light to disinfect spaces;
• Airports which monitor and control air quality inside terminals via air and surface disinfection technology based on natural chemical reactions and new real-time air quality sensors;
• Airports with contactless interfaces and services such as click and collect options; voice control for different airport services and functions; and ultrasound facilities for reading ID.

Beyond airports, the candidates’ technology and experimental projects could potentially benefit everyone working in tourism and transport. For this reason, the judging panel was made up of representatives from all these different sectors. The judges were Edward Arkwright, deputy CEO of the Groupe ADP (and the panel’s chairman); Bernard Giry, special advisor for digital technology, innovation and research to the president of the Ile-de-France regional authority; Guy Zacklad, director of the Paris-CDG Hub and ground operations for Air France; Carole Desnot, innovation and research director at the SNCF; Frédéric Fontaine, senior vice-president at the AccorHotels Innovation Lab; and Franck Mereyde, deputy CEO at TAV Airports.

After working collaboratively with the Groupe ADP’s professional teams, as of this summer the three winners will be able to trial their products and services in Paris’ airports.

“In the space of a month, several inspiring, ambitious projects were sent to us from across the world, providing us with a powerful resource for redesigning passenger journeys and boosting public confidence in coming back to airports. We want to use all these fresh new ideas to work with entrepreneurs on a new model for airports that combines high-quality public health provision with a great traveller experience. As such, the three winners’ solutions will be rolled out in Paris from this summer and may appear in all our network’s airports over the coming months,” according to Groupe ADP’s deputy CEO Edward Arkwright.

 “Through this call for applications, we combined Choose Paris Region’s international sourcing abilities with the Groupe ADP’s operational expertise so that we could analyse several hundreds of technological solutions in record time. These solutions will enable us to reassure travellers and make a very real contribution to economic renewal in Europe’s premier economic region. The results show how effective public-private partnerships can be in serving the people of the Paris region,” says Choose Paris Region’s chairman, Franck Margain.

The three other shortlisted finalists’ proposals were:

 Detektin (France) : an automated tunnel which uses ultraviolet light to disinfect the trays in which passengers store their belongings during airport security checks.

Outsight (France) : 3D laser scanning that monitors human traffic by measuring distances, shapes and objects’ sizes

Sitata (Canada) : a travel companion that allows people to stay informed, avoid risks and contact help when they need to, with information about health precautions, strikes, safety and security measures, vaccinations, recommended medication and more