Bordeaux Airport deploys Outsight solution to reduce passenger waiting times

This initiative is part of the airport’s continuous improvement approach, aimed at enhancing passenger flow and operational performance.

Welcoming nearly 6 million passengers annually to 92 destinations, Bordeaux Airport places quality of experience and operational efficiency at the heart of its management.

In an environment where infrastructure is inherently constrained, optimising existing spaces, dynamic queue management, and anticipating congestion points are key to maintaining smooth operations.

In order to refine its understanding of passenger flows and make its operational decisions more objective, the airport has chosen to experiment with a complete Motional Digital Twin, capable of modeling movements within the terminal in real time.

What’s a Motional Digital Twin?

How the third generation of Digital Twin technology is transforming the way infrastructure operators understand and optimize the movement of people and vehicles.

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Developed by Outsight, this technology relies on the creation of a Motional Digital Twin of the terminal. It provides a continuous, three-dimensional view of passenger movements in targeted areas, including security checkpoints and other critical spaces.

The flows are digitised in a strictly anonymous manner within a shared spatial repository system, allowing for the analysis of queue formation, density changes, and the actual use of different areas. The system operates without image capture or personal identification, guaranteeing confidentiality by design while offering a accurate operational representation of the reality on the ground.

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Talel Jaouad, Head of Airport Process Department at Bordeaux Airport: “We are experimenting with this technology to improve our understanding and control of passenger flow, allowing us to optimize our resources. The ultimate goal, of course, is passenger satisfaction. For our staff, as well as our partners operating in the terminals - airlines, service providers, and retailers - this pilot represents an undeniable advantage for fine-tuning their actions in real time and within a framework of continuous improvements.”

Already deployed in several leading international airports, Outsight’s solution is among the emerging technologies for managing complex infrastructures. At Bordeaux Airport, it is being deployed in specific areas of Hall A to evaluate its impact under real-world operating conditions.

This pilot phase will allow teams to have a shared and objective view of passenger flows, to more precisely adjust resources according to demand, and to improve operational coordination between the different companies and governmental services involved in welcoming passengers.

The objective is to concretely assess the contribution of Physical AI to the continuous optimisation of processes and the overall fluidity of passenger journeys.

Raul Bravo, President and Co-Founder of Outsight “The use of Physical AI is becoming a standard in how modern airports operate, regardless of their size. Today, what matters is not size, but relevance. Airports like Bordeaux are adopting proven technologies that integrate seamlessly into their operations and deliver immediate and tangible added value.”

This initiative illustrates a fundamental trend in the airline industry: passenger flow management, supported by data and artificial intelligence, is gradually becoming a key lever for operational performance.

About Outsight

Outsight’s Physical AI continuously digitizes the movement, behavior, and interactions of people, vehicles and robots at scale, producing real-time Spatial Intelligence built on 3D LiDAR data and enriched with other available data sources.

Operators of large, complex environments, including transportation hubs such as airports and train stations, sports and entertainment venues, road infrastructure, and industrial sites, rely on this Spatial Intelligence to enhance operations, improve visitor experiences, and strengthen safety and security.

We support customers across five continents from our offices in Paris, San Francisco, Singapore and Hong Kong, driven by the belief that accelerating the global adoption of Spatial Intelligence will lead to a smarter, safer, and more sustainable world.

Frequently Asked Questions

How does a Physical AI system at an airport security checkpoint actually reduce wait times?

The reduction comes from shifting resource deployment from schedule-based to demand-based. A LiDAR-powered Motional Digital Twin measures queue length and density continuously, many times per second, and forecasts where bottlenecks will form before they become visible to staff. At Bordeaux Airport, Outsight deployed this approach across strategic areas of Hall A, giving operations teams the ability to open additional lanes or redirect agents in advance rather than in reaction. The gain is not faster screening; it is eliminating the lag between a queue forming and a staffing response.

What is a pilot deployment at an airport and how is it structured before a full rollout?

A pilot focuses sensors on a bounded subset of the terminal, typically one hall or a specific checkpoint cluster, to gather measurable operational data under live conditions without committing to full infrastructure coverage. The evaluation period benchmarks KPIs such as queue dwell time, peak density, and resource utilization against a baseline. Outsight followed this model at Bordeaux Airport among many others, initially deploying its Physical AI solution across strategic areas of Hall A before any wider rollout. Results from a pilot determine sensor placement, analytics configuration, and business-case figures for scaling across the full terminal.

Can a single airport flow system give airlines, retailers, and security agencies a shared operational picture?

Yes. Because the Motional Digital Twin generates a shared, anonymous spatial reference, multiple operators working in the same terminal, ground handlers, airlines, concession retailers, and border control agencies, can all query the same data layer through role-specific dashboards or API feeds. Each party sees only the metrics relevant to their zone and function, while the underlying data remains consistent across all of them. This removes the conflicting counts and coordination gaps that arise when each party runs separate measurement systems. At Bordeaux Airport, Outsight deployed this approach across strategic areas of Hall A, giving distinct operational teams a single, coherent picture of terminal flow without requiring any party to share raw data outside its own domain.

How does LiDAR-based passenger tracking work in a terminal without capturing any images?

LiDAR emits laser pulses and measures the time each pulse takes to return after hitting a surface. The result is a stream of 3D points describing the geometry and motion of objects in the space, with no pixel or color information recorded at any stage. A person appears as a moving 3D shape, not as a face or silhouette. Because there is nothing image-like in the raw data, facial recognition or biometric inference is structurally impossible, not merely prohibited by policy. This is the principle behind Outsight's approach, where infrastructure-mounted LiDAR sensors feed the Motional Digital Twin to track passenger flows across terminal areas while remaining anonymous by definition.

Does airport size affect whether a Physical AI flow solution is worth deploying?

Scale affects the scope of deployment, not the fundamental value proposition. A regional airport handling a few million passengers per year faces the same core constraint as a hub: fixed infrastructure, variable demand peaks, and multiple service providers who need a common operational picture. The per-lane or per-checkpoint return on reducing queue dwell time is comparable regardless of total passenger volume. Bordeaux Airport, handling close to 6 million passengers annually across 92 destinations, represents a mid-size case where the economics are demonstrably viable. Outsight's deployment there, covering strategic areas of Hall A through the SHIFT platform, demonstrates that a Motional Digital Twin scales down to regional facilities just as effectively as it does at larger hubs like Dallas Fort Worth.

What data can airport operations teams actually act on in real time from a Motional Digital Twin?

The live output from a Motional Digital Twin covers occupancy per zone, queue length at each checkpoint, density thresholds crossed or approaching, dwell time distributions, and throughput rates. Each metric can trigger an alert the moment it crosses an operator-defined threshold, with end-to-end latency under 50 milliseconds from sensor pulse to dashboard event. At Bordeaux Airport, Outsight deployed this capability across strategic areas of Hall A, giving operations teams a continuous, anonymous 3D picture of passenger flow without capturing faces or biometric data. Alongside the live feed, historical replay lets teams examine any past period in 3D to identify root causes and refine staffing models.