Aurrigo in aviation 2024: A soaring UK self-driving success story
In this highly anticipated long-read, Professor David Keene, Automotive Council UK board member and CEO of Coventry-based Aurrigo International plc, explains how he grew a successful self-driving business from traditional automotive roots.
How did Aurrigo get into automated mobility?
DK: “I started what was, and still is, an automotive company back in 1993. So, 31 years of designing and developing products for some of the best-known premium vehicle brands in the world, the likes of Aston Martin, Bentley, Jaguar Land Rover and McLaren.
“My background is technical, in electronic systems and software development. Over the years we built up our expertise so that we could effectively design a complete vehicle from a blank sheet of paper.
“Around 2014, I thought, okay, let’s do something interesting to demonstrate our capability, so I got our team to convert a vehicle so that it operated with just a steering wheel, pedals and an iPad.
“It worked well. People were fascinated that you could unlock the car, access the in-car entertainment, and do things like turning the wipers on and change the heating. So, then I wondered: Could we remove the steering wheel, and the pedals, and get it to drive itself? How difficult could it be? Turns out, really difficult!
“Around that time, we became a founding member of the Niche Vehicle Network, a group of small UK car companies and suppliers including the likes of Ariel and Morgan. That caught the attention of Innovate UK, and, through them, the government commissioned us to work on the Lutz project, developing a drive-by-wire platform for a two-seater autonomous vehicle.
“We successfully trialled that in Milton Keynes, so the next step was to write our own software. Fast forward to today and our relatively small team of 100 or so people can design and develop fully finished vehicles running on our own automated software stack.”
How did you come to specialise in aviation?
“After Lutz, we built a four-seater called the Auto-Pod, and then the larger Auto-Shuttle. We trialled those in Cambridge, Milton Keynes, Scotland, even Eastern Europe. We were quite prolific, and our profile was rising quickly.
“Then, one day, something amazing happened; we got a call from a guy in the innovation team of International Airlines Group (IAG), who said: ‘We’ve seen what you’re doing with passenger vehicles, but could your technology move baggage or cargo containers?’
“Of course, we said ‘Yes’, so we entered into a contract with IAG and Heathrow Terminal 5 for British Airways. That was in 2018, and you’ll find lots of videos and press cuttings from that era. We were especially proud to win the Heathrow technology of the year award, and new opportunities opened-up from there.
“In late 2019, Innovate invited me to attend an intelligent transport show in Singapore, where we met the innovation team for Changi Airport. Within 30 minutes we’d agreed to work together. We signed an agreement in February 2020 and then, in March, the world changed with the pandemic.
“While everyone else battened down the hatches, Changi did the opposite. They said, ‘Look, it’s going to be quiet, let’s carry on with these technology projects and see if we can get ahead’.
“So, we worked remotely developing our Auto-Sim 3D digital twin software. We built that all through Covid, enabling us to model how the airport operates today, and how it might operate in the future.”
What are the technical challenges of self-driving for aviation?
“The first good thing about working in an airport is that it’s highly regulated, the people are highly trained, and there are lots of processes, procedures and safety checks. There’s still a lot of clutter airside – staff and other vehicles like tow trucks and catering wagons – but generally it’s a very controlled environment. The second really great thing is the low speeds.
“We’ve been very fortunate to have stumbled across this niche because, in terms of commercialisation, that’s all the key things you want. When I started looking at autonomy all those years ago, I promised myself: ‘Whatever you do, don’t go into fast road cars, because that’s really complex’.
“From a technical perspective, airside operations are difficult, but they’re a lot easier than public roads. You’re much less likely to encounter a horse which has broken out of its field – all these edge cases you must solve in a car of the future… and solve really quickly because you’re travelling at 70mph on a motorway! Those sorts of things just don’t happen in an airport environment.
“Coming out of Covid, there was a serious workforce issue in that tens of thousands of ground staff had been laid off. In Singapore this was a particular challenge as the conditions can be harsh; 45-50 degree heat and monsoon storms to contend with. They were struggling to attract people back, so our business case really emerged.
“On top of that, a lot of the time, tug drivers are being paid to tow fresh air, which isn’t very efficient. If you automate that, you can take those valuable security cleared staff and put them into different applications.
“At Changi, we’re at the point where our all-electric, autonomous Auto-DollyTug can go into a baggage hall, line-up and stretch out its’ robotic arms, collect a container and pull it onto the vehicle bed, drive along a roadway to a stand where an aircraft is waiting, enter that stand, work out where the loader bay is, dock with it, and push the container through the cargo door, all completely automatically.
“There are specific challenges in operating close to aircraft. The International Air Transport Association (IATA) say the cost of damage caused by ground support equipment (GSE) runs to billions of dollars a year worldwide.
“We’ve proved that our vehicle can do its job repeatedly and reliably, thanks to a load of amazing features. It not only goes forward and backwards, but sideways, left and right. It can twist through 360 degrees, or, indeed, whatever angle you want. It can lift and lower to any of the deck heights in the airport, on either the right or left hand-side.
“Until our vehicle, loading and unloading containerised baggage was considered very difficult while a catering wagon was jacked up to the top deck. Those jobs had to be sequenced. Our sideways capability means they can now happen simultaneously.
“And we do all this in very high temperatures and in very heavy rainfall. Our in-house rain algorithm enables us to operate in up to 50mm per hour of precipitation, way ahead of anybody else.”
Where do you see Aurrigo in five years?
“This year we have already added five more airports to the list with vehicles in the US, UK, Germany and Holland. The next phase of the Changi project is to increase the number of vehicles, to work as a fleet under our cyber-resilient Auto-Connect platform. This involves things like identifying the most optimal Auto-DollyTug available.
“So in five years, we want to be in every one of the 600 or so major international airports, moving baggage and cargo around autonomously, interfacing seamlessly with the aircraft and all the other manual processes and staff. That would be a beautiful day.”
“With passenger cars and robotaxis, you’ve got to ask: Where’s the business case? How long will it be before it returns some profit? That’s why we’ve switched our main focus to this aviation niche.
“We’re the first UK company to come from private ownership, with backing on autonomy from the government, all the way through to listing as a public company and expanding around the world with offices now in Australia, Singapore, Canada, and the US.”
