Eurocontrol Uses DesignVerse AI to Modernize European Air Traffic Stack
Ai4
The European air traffic manager cuts software delivery costs by 50% using domain-specific AI to rewrite legacy control systems directly in production without risking operational downtime.
## Background
This panel discussion was published on YouTube by Ai4 on August 15, 2026. According to the page description, it features Andrei Manolache (DesignVerse), Razvan Marginean (EUROCONTROL), and moderator Nancy Scola discussing how Europe's air traffic network safely modernizes legacy, mission-critical infrastructure directly in production using AI and dynamic context layers.
## TL;DR
EUROCONTROL manages around 10 million European flights annually, but relies on a 30-year-old legacy software stack where any unscheduled downtime carries immense financial and operational costs. To overcome this technical debt, EUROCONTROL partnered with startup DesignVerse to deploy a specialized context layer connecting user interface design systems, aviation domain logic, and back-end code generation. A 1.5-month pilot modernized an operational airspace mapping application to React and Java, doubling engineering code output and cutting delivery costs by 50% compared to generic AI coding tools. Looking forward, the initiative aims to bridge operational experts and developers through natural language tools while ensuring digital sovereignty via small, on-premise domain-specific LLMs under 100 billion parameters.
## Atmosphere & style
The panel maintains an authoritative, pragmatic, and highly technical enterprise tone suited for high-stakes aviation and technology policy. Moderator Nancy Scola guides a structured, forward-thinking dialogue that balances immediate software engineering realities with broader strategic themes like digital sovereignty. The dynamic between Razvan Marginean and Andrei Manolache blends operational caution with startup agility, creating an earnest, solution-oriented atmosphere focused on real-world implementation rather than artificial intelligence hype.
## Key takeaways
- [00:04](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnqOx4xmrg8&t=4s) EUROCONTROL manages the overall European airspace network across multiple sovereign states, coordinating over 10 million flights annually and peak traffic of 37,000 daily flights.
- [00:50](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnqOx4xmrg8&t=50s) EUROCONTROL relies on its Integrated Network Manager (INM), a proprietary legacy software stack built over 30 years, where unscheduled delays cost approximately €100 ($115 USD) per minute.
- [10:04](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnqOx4xmrg8&t=604s) General-purpose AI coding tools struggle with deep domain constraints in regulated industries, prompting EUROCONTROL to partner with startup DesignVerse to capture operational context.
- [08:44](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnqOx4xmrg8&t=524s) In a pilot project modernizing an airspace map application to React and Java, DesignVerse completed full-stack migration in 1.5 months, halving delivery costs and doubling developer output.
- [12:03](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnqOx4xmrg8&t=723s) DesignVerse enables non-technical stakeholders to modify both front-end UI and back-end logic in real time using natural language, achieving 80% to 90% production-ready code.
- [13:16](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnqOx4xmrg8&t=796s) EUROCONTROL uses a hybrid AI approach, leveraging general-purpose LLMs like Claude for general development alongside specialized domain tools for regulatory and architectural alignment.
- [17:32](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnqOx4xmrg8&t=1052s) DesignVerse aims to expand its domain transformation framework beyond aviation into other heavily regulated industries with legacy debt, specifically banking and cybersecurity.
- [18:24](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnqOx4xmrg8&t=1104s) EUROCONTROL's 10-year strategic vision focuses on harmonizing its operational product suite using natural language interfaces to bridge domain experts and software engineers.
- [19:21](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnqOx4xmrg8&t=1161s) To address digital sovereignty and geopolitical risks associated with major commercial LLMs, DesignVerse is developing small, specialized on-premise models under 100 billion parameters.
## Detailed walkthrough
Here is the detailed walkthrough of the transcript part:
[00:04](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnqOx4xmrg8&t=4s) Introduction and the High-Stakes Modernization Challenge
Moderator Nancy Scola, a Washington, D.C.-based technology journalist, opens the panel discussion on how Europe’s air traffic control network, EUROCONTROL, is deploying artificial intelligence. The central question of the session is how to successfully implement AI in a high-stakes, highly regulated environment like aviation. She introduces the two panellists: Andrei Manolache, CEO of DesignVerse—a startup founded in Bucharest in 2024 to build specialized AI software for established industries—and Razvan Marginean, Innovation Program Manager at EUROCONTROL.
Razvan Marginean sets the stage by explaining EUROCONTROL's role. Unlike local air traffic controllers sitting in airport towers, EUROCONTROL manages the overall aviation network across Europe. The organization coordinates airspace for multiple sovereign states and diverse stakeholders, acting as a unified entity.
- EUROCONTROL handles approximately 10 million flights annually, with peak traffic reaching up to 37,000 flights per day.
- A core operational objective is minimizing flight delay minutes across airlines and air traffic control centers; slot delays for flights traveling between North America and Europe are frequently managed by EUROCONTROL.
[00:50](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnqOx4xmrg8&t=50s) The Integrated Network Manager (INM) and Technical Debt
Marginean details the core technical bottleneck facing EUROCONTROL. The organization relies on a single, highly specialized, legacy software stack built over more than 30 years of in-house development. Because this software is custom-tailored rather than an off-the-shelf enterprise product, modernizing it presents immense operational risks.
The digital transformation initiative, known as the Integrated Network Manager (INM) program, aims to migrate operations to cloud-based architecture and integrate modern AI workflows into their engineering processes without taking live systems offline.
- Unscheduled downtime or inefficiencies carry direct financial costs: every single minute of system delay incurs approximately €100 ($115 USD) in cost passed to airlines and ultimately passengers.
- EUROCONTROL is using AI to address two primary friction points: shortening the lengthy requirements-to-code cycle across non-technical stakeholders, and accelerating the transition from legacy, niche languages to modern software stacks.
[06:04](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnqOx4xmrg8&t=364s) Trusting a New Startup for Enterprise Modernization
Addressing why EUROCONTROL partnered with DesignVerse—a company only two years old—Marginean emphasizes that the urgency to deliver faster forced them to try innovative market solutions. Rather than applying AI directly to mission-critical "crown jewel" flight systems on day one, EUROCONTROL focused on modernizing their broader engineering practices, tooling, and governance.
Andrei Manolache notes that general-purpose AI coding tools—such as Claude Code, Windsurf, Codex, or Cursor—work well for standard, small-scale applications, but fail to account for the deep domain constraints of heavily regulated industries like aviation, banking, cybersecurity, and healthcare. DesignVerse was specifically designed to capture deep domain context to solve these complex enterprise problems.
[08:44](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnqOx4xmrg8&t=524s) The Modernization Pilot: Airspace Map Application
Manolache details the initial modernization project assigned to DesignVerse. The team targeted an operational information board used by air traffic controllers and coordinators to monitor airspaces, sector regulations, and flight sector overlaps across Europe.
The project required rewriting an old Rust, HTML, and CSS application into a modern React and Java architecture. React was chosen to integrate directly with the official EUROCONTROL Design System—one of the few design systems built specifically for aviation software.
- The complete front-end and back-end modernization was completed in just 1.5 months.
- The project achieved a 50% reduction in delivery costs and doubled engineering code output (2x productivity) compared to standard coding tools like Claude Code or GPT Codex.
- Rather than relying on generic public benchmarks (e.g., SWE-bench), performance was measured directly against EUROCONTROL's real-world codebases.
[12:03](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnqOx4xmrg8&t=723s) Live Context and Full-Stack Code Generation
Manolache demonstrates the transition from the legacy UI—which lacked cohesive user experience—to the updated design system interface. Using DesignVerse's web platform, product managers, UX designers, and architects can modify full-stack code using natural language prompts.
Unlike standard prototyping or front-end generators (such as Lovable, v0, or Replit), DesignVerse updates both the front-end UI and the underlying back-end logic simultaneously. In this deployment, the application was hosted live on servers in Brussels, Belgium, generating production-ready code (estimated at 80% to 90% production completeness) that developers could immediately insert into CI/CD pipelines.
[13:16](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnqOx4xmrg8&t=796s) Bridging Operational Knowledge and the AI AI Landscape
Marginean highlights that a major challenge in aviation software development is the gap between non-technical operational experts (who understand airspace mechanics) and software engineers (who write the code). The visual, real-time feedback layer provided by DesignVerse enables operational and technical teams to collaborate directly, significantly cutting down requirements gathering time.
Addressing the broader technology strategy, Marginean explains that EUROCONTROL established an internal AI Center of Excellence. Rather than relying on a single vendor or standard model, EUROCONTROL uses a hybrid approach:
- General-purpose LLMs (like Claude) augment general software development capabilities across their 5,000-employee organization.
- Specialized tools like DesignVerse provide the persistent aviation domain context, architecture mapping, and UI design system alignment required for regulatory compliance.
<ElicitationsGroup message="To explore this case study further:">
<Elicitation label="Summarize the key metrics achieved in the EUROCONTROL modernization pilot" query="What were the specific metrics, timelines, and cost savings achieved during the EUROCONTROL and DesignVerse pilot project?"/>
<Elicitation label="Explain how EUROCONTROL bridges non-technical and engineering teams" query="How does EUROCONTROL use AI and visual design layers to bridge the gap between operational aviation staff and software engineers?"/>
</ElicitationsGroup>
Here is the detailed, faithful walkthrough of the provided transcript section:
[17:32](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnqOx4xmrg8&t=1052s) Expanding Beyond Aviation and Scaling Core Industries
Andrei Manolache explains that DesignVerse is actively leveraging the deep domain knowledge built within aviation to assist other clients who face similar modernization challenges. DesignVerse works closely with EUROCONTROL to share the expertise and frameworks accumulated over two decades of development, applying these principles across the sector to regulators and Air Navigation Service Providers (ANSPs) managing local national airspace. However, the overall vision for DesignVerse extends well beyond air traffic control; the goal is to become the vertical solution for enterprise software transformation across any heavily regulated sector dealing with legacy infrastructure.
While aviation remains a central focus, DesignVerse is aggressively expanding into banking and cybersecurity as its core operational pillars. Manolache notes that the underlying transformation layer can ultimately be tailored to virtually any industry that relies on complex software systems and legacy application stacks.
- **Current focus sectors:** Aviation, Banking, Cybersecurity.
- **Target audience in aviation:** Regulators, local national ANSPs, and enterprise aviation clients.
- **Core value proposition:** Repurposing 20 years of EUROCONTROL domain architecture and applying it to other legacy-bound enterprise sectors.
[18:24](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnqOx4xmrg8&t=1104s) Long-Term Operational Vision and Natural Language Harmonization
When asked by moderator Nancy Scola about his ten-year vision following their initial proof of concept, Razvan Margauan outlines an ambitious strategy for EUROCONTROL's product ecosystem. He highlights the desire to harmonize their extensive portfolio of stakeholder-facing operational products. Rather than relying on fragmented setups, the objective is to build an integrated product stack using simpler, unified tooling and natural language interfaces.
Margauan emphasizes that introducing natural language into the development pipeline helps bridge the persistent gap between specialized technical software expertise and operational domain know-how. While acknowledging that a large-scale transformation of this magnitude will not happen overnight, EUROCONTROL is actively establishing the foundational frameworks now to ensure the platform scales seamlessly as operational requirements evolve.
- **Strategic 10-year goal:** Complete harmonization of EUROCONTROL's stakeholder-facing operational product stack.
- **Bridge between teams:** Utilizing natural language capabilities to connect technical developers directly with operational aviation experts.
- **Implementation strategy:** Establishing modular scaling frameworks today to support future long-term growth across critical aviation infrastructure.
[19:21](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnqOx4xmrg8&t=1161s) Digital Sovereignty and On-Premise Specialized LLMs
Nancy Scola pivots to a broader political and strategic question regarding digital sovereignty and the risks of over-relying on major commercial models—such as Anthropic's Claude—which could be subject to foreign export controls or policy shifts. Andrei Manolache strongly validates this perspective, explaining that DesignVerse aims to empower clients to maintain complete ownership and control over their sensitive operational data and decades of intellectual property.
To achieve true sovereign independence, DesignVerse is developing custom, smaller LLMs designed for local, on-premise deployment. Manolache reveals that by structuring precise contextual layers and architectural guidelines, smaller domain-specific models can generate code and perform specialized business tasks far more efficiently than massive general-purpose models like Claude, GPT, or Qwen. By targeting model sizes under 100 billion parameters, these models can run locally on consumer-grade or commodity GPU hardware that organizations can easily acquire in bulk, ensuring rapid deployment and absolute data privacy for high-security environments.
- **Digital sovereignty rationale:** Protecting mission-critical infrastructure from foreign geopolitical shifts and export restrictions on US-based AI models.
- **Model efficiency:** Specialized models under 100 billion parameters with rich operational context outperform massive models on targeted enterprise tasks.
- **Hardware feasibility:** Engineered to run on readily available consumer-grade hardware deployed entirely on-premise.
---
*(Note: In accordance with your request, obvious speech-to-text recognition errors—such as "Kimiko Tree"—have been silently adjusted to maintain technical precision).*
## Notable quotes
> [00:04](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnqOx4xmrg8&t=4s) How do you modernize mission-critical aviation infrastructure without disrupting live operations? — Nancy Scola
> [00:04](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnqOx4xmrg8&t=4s) EUROCONTROL handles approximately 10 million flights annually, with peak traffic reaching up to 37,000 flights per day. — Razvan Marginean
> [00:50](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnqOx4xmrg8&t=50s) every single minute of system delay incurs approximately €100 ($115 USD) in cost passed to airlines and ultimately passengers. — Razvan Marginean
> [06:04](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnqOx4xmrg8&t=364s) Rather than applying AI directly to mission-critical "crown jewel" flight systems on day one, EUROCONTROL focused on modernizing their broader engineering practices, tooling, and governance. — Razvan Marginean
> [08:44](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnqOx4xmrg8&t=524s) The complete front-end and back-end modernization was completed in just 1.5 months. — Andrei Manolache
> [08:44](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnqOx4xmrg8&t=524s) The project achieved a 50% reduction in delivery costs and doubled engineering code output (2x productivity) compared to standard coding tools like Claude Code or GPT Codex. — Andrei Manolache
> [12:03](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnqOx4xmrg8&t=723s) DesignVerse updates both the front-end UI and the underlying back-end logic simultaneously. — Andrei Manolache
> [13:16](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnqOx4xmrg8&t=796s) Specialized tools like DesignVerse provide the persistent aviation domain context, architecture mapping, and UI design system alignment required for regulatory compliance. — Razvan Marginean
> [17:32](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnqOx4xmrg8&t=1052s) the overall vision for DesignVerse extends well beyond air traffic control; the goal is to become the vertical solution for enterprise software transformation across any heavily regulated sector dealing with legacy infrastructure. — Andrei Manolache
> [19:21](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnqOx4xmrg8&t=1161s) By targeting model sizes under 100 billion parameters, these models can run locally on consumer-grade or commodity GPU hardware that organizations can easily acquire in bulk, ensuring rapid deployment and absolute data privacy for high-security environments. — Andrei Manolache
## Video description
Andrei Manolache - Chief Executive Officer, DesignVerse
Razvan Margauan - Program Manager, EUROCONTROL
Nancy Scola - Veteran Technology Reporter, —
How do you modernize mission-critical aviation infrastructure without disrupting live operations?
EUROCONTROL — the organization coordinating air traffic operations across Europe — shares how it is transforming legacy air traffic systems using DesignVerse, creating a live context layer across architecture, design systems, and operational logic to safely modernize software directly in production.
How to turn legacy systems into structured operational context by connecting architecture, design systems, and runtime logic into a unified transformation layer
\- Eliminate drift between design and production, with every change aligned to real operational constraints
\- Proven modernization in one of the world’s most regulated, safety-critical aviation environments
To modernize Europe's air traffic network without disrupting live operations, EUROCONTROL is combining general-purpose language models with domain-specific AI tooling to refactor decades of legacy software while protecting operational continuity and data sovereignty.
High Operational Stakes and Legacy Technical Debt (0:04)
EUROCONTROL coordinates airspace across multiple European sovereign states, managing roughly 10 million flights each year with peak volumes reaching 37,000 daily flights. According to Innovation Program Manager Razvan Marginean, the agency operates under extreme operational constraints: every single minute of system delay creates approximately €100 ($115 USD) in costs passed down to airlines and travelers. However, the organization relies on a single, in-house software stack accumulated over more than 30 years.
Through its Integrated Network Manager (INM) initiative, EUROCONTROL is attempting to migrate these critical workflows to cloud-native systems without incurring unscheduled downtime. The agency identified two primary engineering bottlenecks: long requirement-gathering cycles between operational domain specialists and developers, and the slow, risky process of converting legacy codebases into modern software languages.
Pilot Modernization and Engineering Outcomes (8:44)
Rather than deploying AI directly to mission-critical flight-control cores immediately, EUROCONTROL targeted engineering practices and auxiliary operational tools. The agency partnered with DesignVerse, an AI software startup founded in 2024, to modernize an operational information board used by air traffic controllers to track sector regulations and airspace overlaps. The existing tool—built in Rust, HTML, and CSS—was rewritten into a modern React and Java architecture aligned with EUROCONTROL's standardized design system.
According to DesignVerse CEO Andrei Manolache, the front-end and back-end modernization finished in 1.5 months. Manolache reported a 50% drop in delivery costs and a twofold increase in code output compared to standard tools like Claude Code or Codex. He noted that the platform generates full-stack code that is roughly 80% to 90% production-ready, allowing product managers and architects to revise application logic simultaneously through natural language prompts.
Hybrid AI Strategy and Operational Alignment (13:16)
EUROCONTROL established an internal AI Center of Excellence relying on a two-tier hybrid architecture. General-purpose large language models, such as Claude, assist the broader 5,000-employee workforce with routine software tasks, while specialized tools provide the deeper context, design rules, and architectural constraints necessary for aviation compliance.
Marginean emphasized that this visual, prompt-driven interface helps close the communication divide between non-technical airspace specialists and software engineers. Over a ten-year horizon, EUROCONTROL envisions fully harmonizing its stakeholder-facing operational product suite through unified natural language interfaces.
Digital Sovereignty and On-Premise Models (19:21)
Moderator Nancy Scola raised concerns about European organizations relying on foreign, US-based commercial models that may be vulnerable to regulatory or export restrictions. In response, Manolache noted that DesignVerse is developing smaller, domain-specific models under 100 billion parameters designed for local, on-premise execution.
Manolache claimed that these specialized architectures, when provided with rich contextual frameworks, can match or exceed the performance of massive general-purpose models on focused tasks. Running sub-100-billion-parameter models on commodity, consumer-grade GPU hardware allows organizations in sensitive sectors like aviation, banking, and cybersecurity to retain full intellectual property and data sovereignty.
While EUROCONTROL achieved significant speedups in its pilot, broader transformation across its 30-year legacy footprint remains an ongoing, multi-year process. The agency's long-term vision depends on scaling domain-specific context layers without compromising regulatory compliance or system uptime.
[0:04] Nancy Scola: How do you modernize mission-critical aviation infrastructure without disrupting live operations?
[0:04] Razvan Marginean: EUROCONTROL handles approximately 10 million flights annually, with peak traffic reaching up to 37,000 flights per day.
[0:50] Razvan Marginean: every single minute of system delay incurs approximately €100 ($115 USD) in cost passed to airlines and ultimately passengers.
[6:04] Razvan Marginean: Rather than applying AI directly to mission-critical "crown jewel" flight systems on day one, EUROCONTROL focused on modernizing their broader engineering practices, tooling, and governance.
[8:44] Andrei Manolache: The complete front-end and back-end modernization was completed in just 1.5 months.
[8:44] Andrei Manolache: The project achieved a 50% reduction in delivery costs and doubled engineering code output (2x productivity) compared to standard coding tools like Claude Code or GPT Codex.
[12:03] Andrei Manolache: DesignVerse updates both the front-end UI and the underlying back-end logic simultaneously.
[13:16] Razvan Marginean: Specialized tools like DesignVerse provide the persistent aviation domain context, architecture mapping, and UI design system alignment required for regulatory compliance.
[17:32] Andrei Manolache: the overall vision for DesignVerse extends well beyond air traffic control; the goal is to become the vertical solution for enterprise software transformation across any heavily regulated sector dealing with legacy infrastructure.
[19:21] Andrei Manolache: By targeting model sizes under 100 billion parameters, these models can run locally on consumer-grade or commodity GPU hardware that organizations can easily acquire in bulk, ensuring rapid deployment and absolute data privacy for high-security environments.
Original transcript
[0:04] My name is Nancy Scola and thank you so much for
being here. I'm a journalist based in Washington,
[0:08] D.C. And I'm happy to be here this morning to
moderate a conversation on what I think is a
[0:12] particularly fascinating topic. How Europe's air
traffic control network, known as Eurocontrol,
[0:18] is modernizing using AI. And the specific
question we're going to answer is,
[0:22] how do you go about deploying AI that is a perfect
fit for a high-stakes industry like aviation?
[0:28] And we have a great set of guests here
joining us to discuss this. We've Andre
[0:32] Manolaque. I practiced that. Thank
you. Andre is CEO of Design Verse,
[0:37] a startup founded in Bucharest in 2024 that builds
AI software for well-established industries.
[0:44] And we have Razvan Marginean. Razvan is an
innovation program manager at Eurocontrol. So,
[0:50] Razvan, we're going to start with you and we're
going to start at the beginning. When it comes to
[0:53] the AI deployment project we're here to discuss,
what problem were you actually trying to solve?
[0:59] Thank you, good morning. Okay, I'm I'm also on.
Um Look, we and I'll give a bit of context about
[1:07] Eurocontrol and what we do as well because I
think it's very relevant for the discussion.
[1:10] One of the problems that we had to solve is how
to get from a legacy infrastructure built over
[1:16] decades of in-house experience into a more modern
infrastructure. And that's part of this whole
[1:22] digital transformation that we're undergoing
that's still ongoing now at Eurocontrol.
[1:27] Um so, maybe if you want, I could also give a
bit of context on that. Yes, please. Sure. Oh. Um
[1:36] I anticipated that maybe not too many people are
familiar with Eurocontrol. Maybe a a quick show of
[1:41] hands if you know or have heard of Eurocontrol
before. So, okay. Well, glad to see some
[1:48] some hands up. In a nutshell, Eurocontrol
it manages the aviation network. We're not
[1:55] air traffic controllers per se. We do network
management. Um basically around 10 million flights
[2:01] a year pass through our airspace. Uh and on a
busy day we have around 37,000 flights per day.
[2:07] So, I think what makes Eurocontrol unique, uh
it's very similar to FAA uh and it's managing
[2:14] a lot of different states, a lot of different
stakeholders so that you have a combined airspace
[2:19] and we act as one. Um and that's definitely a
challenge. Um definitely in terms of systems,
[2:25] but also in terms of stakeholder management. So,
as I said, um it's quite a legacy organization.
[2:34] Um really focused on air traffic control
flight management. And a lot of interconnected
[2:40] stakeholders. At the end of the day we make
sure or we try to optimize the minutes of delay.
[2:45] Why? Because minutes of delay cost. And how do you
do this? You do this through coordination across
[2:50] different airlines, air traffic control centers,
and so on and so forth. So, not not to bore you
[2:54] with all the industry jargon. Uh but every flight,
so sometimes when you're flying from the US and
[3:00] you have to go through Europe, you may have a slot
that's missed. That's partly because of us. Uh
[3:06] fundamentally that's what we do operationally. But
actually we have a lot of uh software competence.
[3:11] So, we have a single system that manages
that. Which makes it um a bit of a challenge.
[3:18] So, one of our challenges is for example this
regulated environment that we operate in.
[3:23] Um keeping know-how and governance over our
stack, over our data, and integrating these
[3:31] more modern processes, AI, and so on and so
forth into our existing engineering processes,
[3:36] into our tool stack, converting from a legacy
tool stack, which is very niche. It's not a um
[3:41] enterprise solution that you get off the shelf.
It's really tailored to our particular needs.
[3:46] Uh so, this was a fundamental challenge
that we had of how do we speed up our
[3:50] development process? How do we reshape a bit
to access these new technologies on the market?
[3:56] And that's where our journey started. Again, for
us, mission critical is a system that if it's
[4:04] down, every minute of delay is the equivalent
of okay, 100 euros, but around 115 dollars,
[4:10] which is cost passed on to the airlines, which
fundamentally is cost that the end users or the
[4:16] flight or the passengers have to undertake. So,
this means that the system is unique. 30 years
[4:24] plus of engineering technical debt, and we can't
switch it off, right? So, every time we have to
[4:29] modernize, we have to make sure that the existing
system still works. And that's part of this
[4:36] digital transformation program, which is
called the INM, Integrated Network Manager.
[4:40] And one of the key things that we wanted to do is
to also invest in new technologies in cloud-based
[4:45] operations, which is very new for air traffic
control, but also in AI and speeding up our
[4:51] existing processes. So, we have two good use cases
that we see in AI. One of them is more speeding up
[4:59] our, let's say, requirement gathering process.
So, because we have multiple stakeholders,
[5:04] the journey to get from requirement to actual code
is quite lengthy. And we've seen that AI or some
[5:12] technologies help us do this much quicker. Which
for us translates into quicker delivery time,
[5:17] which fundamentally from a program of such a large
scale, this is one of the number one criteria.
[5:22] And the other is transitioning to a more
modern technology stack. We have quite some
[5:28] ancient technologies, which are modern, which are
traditional, but very, let's say, safety proof,
[5:33] but we have to adapt to a new industry
context. So, one of the challenges that we
[5:40] had was to do exactly this. How do we do it
quickly? How do we get to a new tech stack?
[5:45] And how do we make sure that uh it all
works seamlessly? So, I think maybe Andre,
[5:53] you could uh give us a bit of a use case what we
we've done or Before before we jump to Andre, what
[5:59] you mentioned uh the sort of like mission-critical
systems that you were looking to modernize.
[6:04] Why I mentioned Design Versus a 2-year-old
company? As great as Andre is, why were
[6:08] you willing to trust that modernization to a
company that's only been around a couple years?
[6:13] It's a very good question. Um so, we are at the
brink of this digital transformation journey. We
[6:20] also had a let's say difficult part of the program
where we needed to deliver much quicker. Um and
[6:27] we thought look, now is a good time to invest. If
we need to get uh quicker development capability,
[6:33] why not try something new? Of course, we didn't
target our mission-critical our crown jewel,
[6:37] so to speak, from the onset, right? This is not
something that's uh easy to do and there's a whole
[6:43] certification process. Don't imagine that uh now
you can switch on a tool and suddenly your flight
[6:48] management system is changed overnight. It doesn't
work like that. Uh but it gave us an opportunity
[6:52] to try to modernize our um whole development
engineering practices so that we can start to
[6:58] target these more mission-critical systems once
we have the processes, the governance in place.
[7:03] It's not just about a magical tool. It's the
whole ecosystem around that. And we chose uh well,
[7:08] one of our partners uh for the fact that it's
something new, it's something that there is not
[7:14] uh let's say consistent or I haven't seen a
consistent market offering for these kind of
[7:18] technologies. And it was very well uh mapped
onto one of our pain points, which was really uh
[7:24] optimizing the time it took us from requirements
to actually getting something to production.
[7:29] So, that's what we we started off with and
then we decided to continue to to scale. Okay.
[7:33] Andre, you're going to give us a bit of
a demo and overview of what you built.
[7:37] Just before we get into that, the when you got
pulled into this project, did you look and say,
[7:41] "Okay, this is going to be easy. This is we
know exactly what to do here." Definitely not.
[7:46] As everybody in this room can imagine,
regulated industries such as aviation, banking,
[7:52] anything along those lines, health care, and
so on. There is software which is 10, 20, 30,
[7:56] 40, 50 years old even. So, we knew from the very
beginning that this was going to be a challenge,
[8:01] but our mission from the very beginning at Design
Verse was to create a solution, an AI solution
[8:07] that can be tailored to critical industries. In
the sense that everybody knows about cloud code,
[8:13] Windsurf, Codex, Kiro, and so on, which are
very good for general use cases, or if you want
[8:18] to build a 10 people application for your company
where you manage something very simple, but there
[8:24] are very few companies who can actually create
something extremely tailored for an industry
[8:28] pillar. And that's what we wanted to prove. We
wanted to start with something very, very hard,
[8:33] which is aviation, air traffic management, and
then from there to start extending into a lot
[8:38] more regulated industries such as banking,
cybersecurity, health care, and and so on.
[8:44] Okay. Great. Do you want to give us a little bit
of I think you have an overview for us. Yeah,
[8:47] definitely. As Razvan mentioned, we didn't
go into the mission-critical software from
[8:51] the very beginning, obviously. So, the very first
modernization project that we were targeted with
[8:56] was an application which is still targeted to the
core user base, but it was mainly an information
[9:02] board for those users to see all of the flight
details, the slots for the airports, and so on.
[9:08] So, the scope was to modernize a Rust plus HTML
CSS application into React plus Java. React
[9:15] was chosen because the existing design system,
which is called the Eurocontrol design system,
[9:20] was already written into React. It's one of the,
if not the only, aviation-specific design systems.
[9:26] So, it was just natural to just reuse
that information where they spent all
[9:30] of the resources to build it to modernize
their existing tech stack. And essentially,
[9:36] what we saw after the modernization process is
that in 1 and 1/2 months we managed to redo the
[9:42] front end and the back end of the application with
a 50% lower delivery cost and two x productivity
[9:49] in terms of the engineering code output. This is
being compared with pretty much market standard
[9:55] coding tools like cloud code or GPT codex. In this
case specifically it was cloud code and that's
[10:01] what we started to see along all of our clients
from all of the business pillars that we were
[10:05] targeting. Those benchmarks are done specifically
on very very specific industry standards.
[10:11] Nobody cares in enterprise if your SV bench is
the best because you're not doing math problems
[10:16] when you're doing aviation obviously. So the
benchmarks are done on those existing code bases.
[10:22] What this brings us to is a compounding
effect. The more our users use our platform,
[10:27] the more the system learns how they're
building code, how to update it,
[10:31] how the code base is going to evolve and so on,
which obviously created compounding effect where
[10:36] it understands from an architecture perspective
how the software is being written and how it
[10:41] can be translated across all pillars of their
organization. I think you guys have over 5,000
[10:45] employees in total. So it's a pretty massive
scale. It's not the scale of Oracle or IBM,
[10:52] but still it's a very very complex organization
that creates those those types of software.
[10:57] And essentially from a visual standpoint this
is how it looked before we came in. As you
[11:02] can see it's pretty legacy. There isn't like a
cohesive way into how to use the application,
[11:07] the UX of it and so on. And after we started the
basically the people started using design verse,
[11:14] the end result was something that was actually
usable by the users. Can you I'm so sorry to
[11:18] interrupt. Can we can the slide one before exactly
what are we looking at there? Is it So this is an
[11:23] application for air traffic controls where they're
seeing the airspaces and the limitations across
[11:27] the map of Europe. It's used for information
purposes. Essentially if there is a conflict or
[11:33] if there is a sector which has a regulation on top
of it, they use this application to see with that
[11:39] the plane basically can pass through that
zone. So, just as a high-level perspective,
[11:44] each country is divided into different
airspaces according to the sectors,
[11:48] to cantons if you're in Switzerland and so on, and
they can see in here where they can distribute the
[11:53] flights across the the countries in Europe. And
if there's something overlapping, if there's a
[11:57] conflict spanning across multiple flights and
so on. multiple countries and so on. Okay.
[12:03] And essentially, we modernized it, and as you
can see right now it's much more cohesive. So,
[12:09] this was done by an internal team, UX designers
and architects, obviously, and the result was a
[12:15] fully working application. In our platform, which
is the web app, this is more targeted for product
[12:22] use cases like AB testing, stakeholder validation,
and so on. Just with natural language, you can
[12:27] change both the front and then the back end at the
same time. The main difference between tools like
[12:31] lovable, bold, whatever, Replit, and so on, is
that what you're seeing right now on the screen
[12:36] is a fully working end-to-end application hosted
on a server in Brussels, in Belgium. The person
[12:41] who put in here a prompt is modifying both the
front and then the back end at the same time.
[12:45] The main point being, after you validate this
with the users, you can actually give the full
[12:50] end-to-end working application to a developer,
and it's going to be 80 to 90% what they would
[12:55] actually put inside production. Sure, you run QA,
you put it into CI/CD, you put it into staging
[13:00] and then production, but it's much more closer
than somebody working in cloud code, and then
[13:04] trying to stitch it together somewhat what the
product designers are doing with with the users.
[13:13] Okay. That's pretty much it. Yeah. Thank you
very much. So, that what we were just looking at,
[13:16] that product, that reflects a detailed
understanding of air traffic control systems,
[13:22] which I'm guessing maybe you didn't come into
the project with. How do you make sure that
[13:26] your controls expertise is reflected in actually
what ends up being built? So, definitely there's
[13:34] a lot of operational expertise that's needed to
understand and to validate this. And this is one
[13:39] of the challenges actually that we have a lot
of operational stakeholders without a technical
[13:42] background. And we have a lot of technical
know-how without operational understanding.
[13:47] So, it's not a it's not so much an easy e-commerce
app that you can kind of pick up on the fly. It's
[13:52] really specific industry know-how. Uh which is why
I personally like this type of use case because
[13:58] it brings those two stakeholders together. So,
it doesn't separate. Uh and we need to keep our
[14:03] operational staff, also our technical staff
because it's years of accumulated know-how.
[14:08] Uh still capable to manage such systems. So,
by offering this kind of also visual type of
[14:15] approach, this product layer, it makes those two
stakeholders work much more seamlessly together.
[14:22] Uh which I think is one of the reasons that we
got this uh much quicker delivery time. Um so
[14:29] Yeah, Andre, the same question for you. How did
that work in practice? What was the partnership
[14:32] like that you made sure you were tapping into the
expertise that Eurocontrol had? From our product
[14:38] design background, we worked mainly in product
and enterprise software before we even started
[14:41] Design Verse. We knew from the very beginning
that in order for something to be successful,
[14:45] so not just a POC that fizzles out after a month,
you need to understand from the deepest level how
[14:50] the software works for your client. And we've
been very very close with their team from the
[14:54] very beginning inherently even before our system
started to understand how they write software,
[14:59] we needed to understand what to tell
the system, what to tell our agents,
[15:03] and all the whole AI pipeline to basically try to
comprehend all of their years of engineering. So,
[15:11] we've been very close from the beginning. After
we started understanding how the software works,
[15:14] the architecture, and how to integrate to the
deepest level with their existing tech stack,
[15:19] then we started uh procuring this information
inside the system, and then it started becoming
[15:24] more and more automated along the way. But, it has
been a very very tight collaboration from the very
[15:28] beginning. Okay. Uh Razvan, one of the challenges
seems to be rather than Andre talks about the
[15:33] benefits of not using Cloud Code or some of these
other off-the-shelf models is that you have a
[15:38] something that is we talked about reflects the
expertise of the industry that you're working in.
[15:41] It also one of the benefits of a working with a
model like Cloud Code is you know it's going to be
[15:45] updated. You know there's a big company behind it
who's putting a lot of money into its development.
[15:49] Are there any tradeoffs with going this
really custom-built uh model approach?
[15:54] I think um so maybe to to take a step back, our
AI landscape is a bit diverse. It's not that we
[16:01] we found one company and we said, "Okay,
everything is going to be done with this."
[16:04] Uh a lot of our investments of okay, in a
nutshell, we set up what we call an AI center
[16:09] of excellence where we look at the different AI
initiatives across the organization. So, this one
[16:15] uh as Andre also mentioned, it's really it's nice
because it bridges that gap between product design
[16:21] uh that operational and technical know-how. Um
as far as I know, I think the model is agnostic
[16:26] of so I think you can use any LLM uh for the code
generation part. But, what is critical for us is
[16:33] really that aviation context which uh Cloud can't
pick up so easily or retain to that level. I think
[16:39] Cloud is more a general-purpose solution which
we rely quite heavily on to augment our software
[16:44] development capabilities, but I don't see it uh
necessarily generating a product based on these
[16:50] requirements within our specific technical
landscape. So, we we combine the two. Um
[16:57] but again, we we don't have a single uh let's
say investment approach where we said, "Okay,
[17:02] now we have this magical tool and it solves all
our problems." We look at the whole landscape
[17:06] holistically, and based on our business
challenges, so there are many. Uh again,
[17:11] it's legacy, it's 30-plus years uh of know-how
uh which now needs to modernize. Also, going
[17:17] cloud-based introduces a different uh type of
skill set that we didn't have internally before.
[17:22] Uh, so there are a lot of things that we have to
manage in parallel. Okay. Okay, thank you. Andre,
[17:26] what happens next? You take this what you've
built here and sell it to the FAA, um, which
[17:32] needs the help, uh, other aviation control systems
around the world, or can you take this and apply
[17:37] this to industries beyond aviation? Uh, it's a
combination of both. Obviously, with the knowledge
[17:43] that we have for a very specific business pillar,
we're trying to extend that to other clients who
[17:46] need this help as well. And that's why even with
Eurocontrol, besides being a client, we're also
[17:51] working with them to spread this information
about what they built for the past 20 years,
[17:55] and what can be applied to other clients in the
same sector, irrespective if there's regulators or
[17:59] just regular ANSPs who are controlling the local
traffic for their country. But, uh, the goal of
[18:05] the company is to become the vertical solution for
any enterprise use case that we target. Currently,
[18:12] it's aviation, banking, and cybersecurity.
These are the main pillars that we operate in,
[18:15] but in the future, this can be tailored
to pretty much any industry that involves
[18:20] software development and legacy applications.
Okay. Razvan, you mentioned that you started
[18:24] with a bit of a small project, right? Sort of
proof of concept, and you're going on from there.
[18:27] What is the big project that you're thinking of
in 10 years? Oh my gosh, if I can pull this off,
[18:31] it's going to be very exciting. I think, uh,
without giving away too much of of our strategy,
[18:37] um, look, I think it would be nice. So, we
have a lot of, um, stakeholder-facing products
[18:44] uh, for our operational clients. It would be
nice if we could harmonize and we could build,
[18:49] uh, on this product stack, uh, using a simpler
tool, using, uh, let's say, even some more
[18:55] natural language, so that we further bridge,
uh, this gap between a lot of technical know-how
[19:00] and a lot of operational know-how, and we have
an integrated product stack. So, that's something
[19:04] that I would like to see scale, uh, going forward.
Again, it's a large transformation project,
[19:10] so that imagine it's going to happen overnight,
but now we're managing to put the frameworks
[19:15] so that when we can start to scale, at least it
meets our requirements. Okay, excellent. Andrei,
[19:21] I I'm mostly a political reporter, so I'm going
to take the prerogative to ask a political some
[19:25] something of political question. You've talked a
little bit or written a little bit about the idea
[19:29] that building these custom-built models, there's a
little bit of a digital sovereignty aspect of this
[19:33] that you're not so dependent on a Anthropic model
that the US government might decide to put export
[19:38] controls on. Can you just talk a little give a
little bit of a pitch on that? Yeah, definitely.
[19:43] Our aim is to empower our clients to take control
over the data and everything that they built for
[19:48] the past 10 to 20 years. And essentially, what
we're building towards is our own LLMs which can
[19:53] be deployed on premise, which are much smaller
than Claude GPT, GLM, Kimiko Tree, and so on,
[19:59] because what we've seen is that with the right
context and the right guidelines, essentially,
[20:04] you can use much smaller models to write code
much more efficiently than just using Claude to do
[20:09] very, very, very specific business tasks. And what
we're building towards is a solution which can be
[20:14] deployed very easily on premise. We're trying to
get our models to be under 100 billion parameters,
[20:18] meaning that you can put it on a consumer grade
GPU, and this can be acquired very easily in bulk
[20:23] from any supplier that you want, and it can
become a solution that can be deployed very,
[20:28] very rapidly across clients with very, very
sensitive information. Okay, excellent. Thank you,
[20:32] Andrei. Thank you, Razvan. Thank you all for
being here. Appreciate it. Thank you. [applause]