Digital Transformation
Digitalization Strategy
Digital transformation is a key aspect of our corporate strategy
Digital transformation is a central part of the Fraport.2030 corporate strategy. Fraport AG understands digitalization as a holistic increase in digital maturity with measurable success.
As part of this strategy, the group is increasingly taking a collaborate approach to designing value creation structures, while working in global ecosystems and adapting to the world’s highly dynamic markets. At the same time, Fraport is focusing on digital and other innovative solutions and technologies. Among other things, this involves integrating artificial intelligence (AI) to optimize the services we provide to customers and employees while automating processes. Fraport is actively leveraging cutting-edge solutions, to shape the future of airports. This is enabling the entire Fraport Group to become more digitalized and competitive – positioning itself at the forefront of the industry's digital transformation.
Four core objectives for our digitalization:
- To reduce costs
- To take advantage of additional sales opportunities
- To continue improving our customers’ experiences
- To introduce and establish new, innovative ways of working
Our understanding of Digitalization: Technology, Action, and Mindset
By leveraging state-of-the-art technologies, strategically adjusting processes, and fostering a digital mindset, Fraport is shaping the future of airports and contributing to the industry's digital transformation. In addition to technological advancements, Fraport places great emphasis on knowledge transfer and the introduction of new working methods to continuously develop the entire group.
Fraport focuses on four core processes: the passenger process, the flight process, the cargo process, and the infrastructure process. Within these processes, the Fraport group targets specific action areas to adopt a customer-centric perspective, optimize the value chain, and make processes more adaptable and faster.
AI@Fraport: Artificial Intelligence as an Enabler
Use of artificial intelligence (AI) in the Fraport Group
Fraport has launched the AI@Fraport initiative with the goal of increasing the satisfaction of airlines and passengers by intelligently automating processes while reducing employees’ work load in their everyday life. We are leveraging innovative AI applications to lay the foundation for our planned growth and prepare the Fraport Group for the future.
Principles for ethically deploying AI in the Fraport Group:
Values-based, responsible use of AI is the prerequisite for benefiting the entire group and its employees. Uses for AI systems are carefully evaluated and assessed to determine whether or not and if so to what extent they actually add value for all of our business activities worldwide. These principles are applied to promote responsible use of AI while providing orientation and guidance for developing, introducing, and utilizing corresponding applications in the Fraport Group. These ethical guidelines will also be applied to all future AI projects groupwide.
Digital Factory
What is the Digital Factory?
Fraport’s Digital Factory is a virtual organizational unit – an in-house “solution partner” – staffed by experts on digitalization and other topics. It helps Fraport’s business units at Frankfurt Airport and elsewhere in the world resolve problems. Over the course of a three-month project phase, a team of experts develops a (usually technical) solution in the form of a “minimum viable product” (MVP).
Here the strategic goals are to strengthen the Fraport Group’s digital maturity and drive the digitalization of our customer processes. Attention initially focuses on identifying the companies in the world that are best at doing whatever is involved. Then the solution is introduced at Fraport within the scope of a collaborative value creation approach. This greatly accelerates the pace of innovation while ensuring that globally leading solutions are applied.
Colleagues from other parts of the company can also join these projects as temporary virtual team members. This lets them acquire new knowledge and methods and disseminate them within the organization and corporate group.
Another of the Digital Factory’s goals is to quickly spot emerging innovations in the market and pave the way for the introduction of convincing solutions at Fraport AG.
Collaboratively adding value
The Digital Factory is well-networked and relies on close collaboration and strong partnerships.
Via 
Within the scope of a collaboration launched in September 2020, the company has access to a global network of technology companies and startups for quickly generating possible solutions.
The partners in Germany include
Digital Factory: Open Call for Projects
(Application deadline: July 3rd 2025)
Initiated projects
Successfully developed MVPs
Supported project rollouts
Assessed solution providers
Bidder pitches made
A variety of solution providers have worked with us
This has been achieved since the launch of the Digital Factory in 2021
Overview of projects: the path to a digital transformation
View selected projects of the Digital Factory
FRA SmartWay
In order to additionally improve the passenger experience by eliminating long, unpleasant waits in line, the Digital Factory searched for a system for digitally booking time slots at the security checkpoints. The winning solution has been in use ever since.
FRA SmartWay emerged from a collaboration with
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Click-2-drive
One of the first projects carried out by the Digital Factory involved introducing automatic reading of vehicle license plates at the entrances to CargoCity South. An innovative new camera system automates the drive-in process at gates 31 and 32; it reads the license plates of visitors’ vehicles and compares the numbers with stored data. The solution has meanwhile been extended to more gates.
The new process was created in collaboration with software service provider
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Object Tracking auf dem Vorfeld
A project team of the Digital Factory came up with a solution for automatically identifying towed baggage trailers on the apron. Thanks to camera-based monitoring of parking areas and AI-based analysis, now far fewer empty and test trips are made and the risk of delays has been reduced, resulting in substantial savings.
The new solution was developed in cooperation with
News on digitalization
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What started as "Südwestdeutsche Luftverkehr AG" is a global player in aviation today.
