How Trans Maldivian Airways optimized an entire seaplane fleet

“In a short period of time, the Optym team was able to grasp the nitty-gritty of the planning process and capture it well in the algorithms developed as part of the system. It is very noteworthy how well they managed the stakeholders and were always proactive in their responses whenever the team had an issue. I am happy to see that Optym team has truly become an extension of our planning team, and the support they provide is really commendable.”

Shubham Moondhara TMA Corporate Strategy and Business Development Head

Background and challenge: 

Trans Maldivian Airways (TMA) operates world’s largest luxury seaplane fleet and serves over flying over 1 million passengers per year through regular and charter flights. TMA has a unique way of operating, with a high level of service. Unlike major airlines, it publishes new schedules every day, depending on the demand from the over 70 resorts that it services. 
 
Trans Maldivian Airways needs to get its passengers to and from island luxury resorts according to passengers’ international flight arrival and departure times. The client required a daily schedule that had to be optimized for multiple objectives, such as flying time, passenger convenience and load factor. Each KPI has a cost associated with it. For example, it is crucial that passengers catch their return flights. If they miss their connection, TMA must pay a penalty. The scheduling gets even more complicated since there is no option to leave a passenger behind, but the number of resources (for example, the crew or aircraft) are limited. 

Solution: 

We worked closely with TMA to understand the problem in detail, digitizing and cleaning up the scheduling data and modeling it mathematically. We made sure the optimization models were flexible enough to honor several practical business constraints. For example, by contract, since the client has to offer premium services to certain high-end resorts, the model had to be flexible enough to model this constraint, while ensuring that the service levels for other resorts and other KPIs were also optimized. 

Optym’s decades of experience in building systems based on optimization intelligence with advanced data visualization techniques enables us to design a planning system that could capture several decades of tribal knowledge that existed with planners and optimize on top of it. In 6 months, the optimization system evolved from an incremental optimizer to a clean sheet schedule creation engine. After a planned cycle of user acceptance tests, the system was accepted by the planning team and creates value for the client daily. 

Results: 

The Optym team quickly grasped the planning process, provided proactive responses, and became an integral extension of TMA's planning team. The collaboration resulted in a streamlined scheduling process, reducing planning time and improving overall service levels, particularly during peak seasons. 
 
Optym's optimization system yielded significant benefits for Trans Maldivian Airways (TMA). The airline observed a notable 3-5% improvement in flight time and increased passenger convenience, leading to improved load factors in the first-cut scheduling stage. The planning cycle was shortened from two days to within a day, showcasing enhanced operational efficiency. 

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