Zayed Airport in Abu Dhabi will soon implement ‘smart travel’ that will eliminate the need for travel documents

Abu Dhabi Airport is launching the “biometric smart travel” project at Zayed International Airport to automate passenger registration, eliminating the need for travel documents and enhancing the passenger travel experience.

The system will use biometric technology to authenticate travelers, cutting processing time and eliminating the need for prior registration for departing passengers.

“The Biometric Smart Travel project reduces the time to serve travelers from 25 seconds to just seven seconds, integrating ticket and travel document verification into a single process and alleviating the burden on human resources by relying on smart gates for identity verification,” Saeed Al Khaili, director general at the ICP, said.

Next 50, which specializes in AI-based transportation solutions will be the partner during the implementation of the project that will be split into three stages.

In this regard, the Abu Dhabi Airports’ goal is summed up by the Media office as follows: Passing on commitment in maintaining required security and safety features in the airport as well as making travel easy and simple for the passengers.

Abu Dhabi Airports and Etihad Airways had deployed the biometric systems at the following contact points of the airport during the new terminal at Zayed International Airport in November.

This includes Automated Traveller Registration System, Self‐Service Bag Drop, and Facial Recognition Check‐in at e‐gates and boarding gates by CBI, no travel documents required and no direct interaction with the airport personnel.

By executing a further phase of this project, Abu Dhabi Airports added biometric check-in for five more airlines at the check-in count for all boarding gates, and the installation of new e-gates in specific zones of the transit area to embark on collecting traveler’s biometric data to enable the facial recognition process.

“By 2025, our aspiration is to have systems in place across all the security and operation touches and other airline,” Andrew Murphy, Chief Information Officer at Zayed International Airport said.

The latest announcement arrived as first quarter passenger traffic at Zayed International Airport rose 36 per cent year-on-year to over 6.8mln.

Combined traffic at the five airports of the Abu Dhabi boosted to 6.9 million passengers 35.6 percent from a year earlier in the three months to March.

Abu Dhabi Airports Company is the operating company of Zayed International, Al Ain International, Al Bateen Executive, Delma Island and Sir Bani Yas Island airports.