The past 6 months have been action-packed, in so many ways.
As you have all already heard, we’ve made changes to reporting lines to move from a regional basis to a more global approach. Later in this newsletter you can read about the planned rollout of ServiceNow, our new ITSM tool, which will replace the end-of-life RemedyForce (Project Skybridge). We’re also introducing an AI tool (Project Propel), which will not only help streamline the Service Desk’s initial call handling but also increase their multi-lingual capabilities.
Doing everything all at once is never a practical approach – but expanding into additional European countries is definitely one of our current goals. Unfortunately, our opportunity in Ireland is only for a short-term project but we have very positive opportunities in Spain and there are a number of other countries we’re actively researching. Early in the second half of 2026 we plan to welcome additional members to the Global Sales Team and they will be instrumental in this expansion.
Our EMEA annual conference and exhibition this year was Passenger Terminal Expo held in London, during March. It was the first outing for our new stand and, overall, a successful show – with a surprisingly large contingent of attendees from North America. As we know, airports tend to be slow to implement change but we had conversations during the show which confirmed our understanding that some European airports are keen to adopt the North American model and separate their systems from their support model. We’ll be happy to help!
In May, I was able to join members of the LHR team as they enjoyed an evening go-karting – I believe a good time was had by all those who attended and the non-racers (myself and Jun) were able to share some ‘action’ shots. This was followed by our annual Group Management Meeting, which focused on our strategy for the future, especially expanding within EMEA. We were then joined by our EMEA Site Managers and learned more about what each of our current sites are doing and the exciting opportunities they have.
Usually in this newsletter we refer to the end of our current financial year – and welcome a new one. This year is different! The current financial year will run until the end of December 2026 (so for 18 months) and that enables us to move our financial year to be in line with the calendar year, which will be easier in many ways. The transition is always the hard part – but we’ll figure it out!
Year to date we are in good shape, although the revenue line has grown more slowly than expected (largely due to delays with project start dates). Hopefully that is about to change because we’ve started work at two new sites in June – welcome to our new staff in YXE (Saskatoon) and MCI (Kansas City) – and expect additional new sites/expansion at others during the coming few months.
As I write, North America is in the grip of World Cup fever. Unlike any other sporting event, this lasts many weeks and is across multiple locations, which is proving very lucrative for the airlines and hotels in all the host cities (but not so great for any of us trying to travel there). I’m sure our teams in LAX, JFK, YVR, OAK and MCI will be happy once it’s all over in mid-July!
The USA will also be celebrating its semi-quincentennial (250th to the rest of us) anniversary on July 4th. TSA is preparing for record passenger numbers on either side of the actual day – if anyone has photos of any decorations or celebrations (I’ve heard rumors of cupcakes!) at their airport then please email them in so we can share them. Simply email your submissions to servicetec@emsl.co.uk
One of the centers for both the World Cup and the 250th celebrations is Philadelphia (the first capital of the USA) – and they are also hosting the ACI-NA annual conference and exhibition in September (not quite as prestigious but….)
ACI-NA has changed their format for 2026 and moved away from holding this event over a weekend – it remains to be seen how successful this is. Our plan is to have a new booth, which we hope will be cheaper to ship and easier to put up!
We will, of course, introduce our 2026 rubber duck – although selecting a suitable one has proved to be a far more difficult process than anticipated, largely because no-one seemed to have what we wanted! Philadelphia had one of the first business districts in the US, and it remains in the top five today – we chose ‘business duck’ accordingly.
In November we will be attending ACI Airports Innovate, which is being held in Barcelona. This is a co-hosted event with ACI World, ACI Europe and ACI Asia Pacific and will be a first time for us. This will also give our new EMEA-based sales resources a chance to meet potential target airports.
As we approach what is already shaping up to be a hot summer, you can see there is a lot going on at ServiceTec – and we are always keen for our existing employees to benefit from the exciting opportunities becoming available. Please keep an eye on our website careers page – not only for yourself but also remember that we offer an incentive to employees for successful referrals of new hires.
Thank you for your continuing hard work and support – let’s keep up this momentum!
