Pursuing business quality in digital age

Quality-control experts gathered in Seattle on Monday to define what quality means in the digital era.

Themed "New Vision of Quality in the Digital Era", the first China-US Quality Summit brought together quality experts, senior leaders and government officials from more than 50 Chinese, US and other multinational organizations across various industries.

The summit is part of the Global Summit on Quality hosted by the American Society for Quality (ASQ) during the 2018 World Conference on Quality and Improvement (April 30-May 2).

"Regardless of size, industry or location, the way we do business is changing due to the rapid advancement of technology, including robotics, the internet of things and artificial intelligence," said ASQ Chairman Elmer Corbin. "There is a lot of expertise in China and the US. What we are trying to do here today is to start the discussion, to bring together the expertise of all over the world."

Zhao Dong, president and CEO of Xiamen Airlines, delivered a speech titled "Chinesestyle Advancement and Innovations in Aviation Services" and shared how the company has contributed to world civil aviation.

On Feb 18, 2010, the left engine of a Xiamen Airlines 737NG aircraft flying from Hangzhou to Shanghai shut down. The pilots stayed calm and safely landed the aircraft with 169 passengers aboard.

The cause was the sudden failure of the hydraulic management unit, a core component of an aircraft engine.

Xiamen Airlines contacted the manufacturer Boeing immediately and was informed that a number of similar incidents occurred in the 737 NG fleet worldwide.

GE, the engine producer, and the hydraulic unit producer Honeywell suggested that this type of incident was not caused by improper aircraft operation or poor maintenance and that it could not be prevented or effectively monitored beforehand.

"We assembled a special technical team, including dozens of senior engineers from various branches of our maintenance and engineering department in the spirit of responsibility for lives and zero tolerance for potential safety hazards," Zhao said.

He said the company analyzed large volumes of data collected since the engine had come out of the factory. Crews studied component maintenance manuals, analyzed the structure and function of the HMU and strove to make technical breakthroughs.

"One can imagine how large the amount of work is," Zhao said. "It is as if looking for a needle in the ocean. During this process, a similar failure happened to another engine, and the team faced even greater pressure."

They had worked continuously for three months, discovering that when the minimum fuel flow during the engine's idling was lower than a certain threshold, the bypass valve malfunctioned.

He said the airline captured data from all 165 CFM56-7B engines of the fleet.

"By analyzing the data, we discovered bypass valve spring damages on 10 aircraft that also had lower idle fuel flow," Zhao said.

Based on its findings, Xiamen Airlines developed an HMU monitoring system.

The airlines shared the monitoring system with GE and Honeywell.

GE has since applied the system to its customers worldwide.

In 2013, Honeywell gratefully acknowledged Xiamen Airlines' contribution in engine reliability.

This year, Xiamen Airlines signed a strategic cooperation agreement with GE in digital innovation.