A report from the IFATCA European Regional Meeting 2025. DIALOG attended to ensure our upcoming AI integration and validation activities are grounded in the real-world operational realities of Air Traffic Controllers.

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Connecting R&D with the Operational Frontline

From October 14th to 16th, Bologna hosted the IFATCA European Regional Meeting (ERM 2025). This major event brought together over 130 delegates from 37 Member Associations, creating a vital forum for the European Air Traffic Control community.

For a research project like DIALOG, attending such events is not just about visibility. It is a critical requirement. Our goal is to develop a “Teamwork Assistant” that supports ATCOs without adding to their workload. To achieve this, we must listen directly to the end-users.

The discussions in Bologna focused on the future of the profession, managing traffic complexity, and the integration of new technologies. The clear message from the operational community was that innovation must always support the human operator, enhancing safety and resilience rather than just adding automation layers.

Focus on Integration and Validation

The DIALOG consortium was represented at the event by Nicola Cavagnetto from Deep Blue, who leads the Work Package dedicated to Integration and use case-based validation.

His participation highlights the specific phase our project is currently navigating. We are moving from concept to prototype. The technical challenge now is ensuring that our AI models for speech recognition and workload assessment can be integrated into realistic operational scenarios.

By engaging with the ATCO community at ERM 2025, the DIALOG team gathers essential feedback to refine these scenarios. This ensures that when we reach our future validation phase, the system is tested against real-world constraints and actual user needs, rather than theoretical assumptions. The goal is to bridge the gap between an engineering prototype and a tool that an ANSP or an ATCO would trust in the ops room.

Shared Priorities: Well-being and Performance

The topics debated by the Member Associations in Bologna align closely with the solutions DIALOG is developing:

  • Well-being and Fatigue: The conference addressed the critical issue of controller fatigue. DIALOG contributes directly to this area by researching unobtrusive physiological sensors (like eye-tracking) to assess cognitive workload in real-time.

  • Resilience and Capacity: Panels discussed the operational pressures of the “Perfect Storm” in aviation capacity. Our project aims to alleviate these pressures by providing an AI assistant that anticipates needs during high-workload peaks, effectively acting as a digital teammate to maintain safety margins.

Charting the Path to Validation

The insights gathered from the European operational community in Bologna are now being fed back into our development cycle.

We are currently actively engaged in the preparatory phases. This involves rigorous prototyping and integration testing to ensure the system is robust and ready for the Human-in-the-Loop validation exercises scheduled for March 2026. The focus remains strictly on the user as we work through these essential steps.

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