Looking back on the past 11 years, the industry has largely delivered on its commitments, although there is still room for improvement. According to Mariagrazia La Piscopia, Executive Director of SESAR Deployment Manager, stakeholders demonstrated a strong commitment to SESAR implementation, supported by effective coordination across the sector.
Deployment has never been an easy task. While specific delays have occurred, they were mainly linked to areas where solutions had not yet reached sufficient industrial maturity. With a more robust industrialisation process, implementation could have progressed at a faster pace.
Lessons learned from the years of deployment
First of all, the role of a deployment coordinator in Air Traffic Management (ATM) modernisation is crucial. “Without an entity coordinating implementation across domains and stakeholder groups, deployment would be significantly slower and far more complex,” said La Piscopia.
A few studies have demonstrated the effectiveness of this coordination role, including the last one carried out by the European Commission in late 2025.
EU Funding has also played a critical role for all operational stakeholders (ANSPs, airlines and airports), which can receive up to 50% co-funding for eligible projects.* It has been critical to accelerate investments, and bring different organisations together in multi-stakeholder projects.
Mariagrazia La Piscopia said that the SESAR Deployment Manager’s Modus Operandi has proven to be effective. The organisation structure brings together people with diverse backgrounds and various profiles, who can share their ATM know-how.
Challenges to overcome
There are some important lessons learned that hopefully can prevent delays in implementation activities in the future. Some projects were difficult to launch due to delays in industrialisation and product availability. In some cases stakeholders could not buy products to update their systems, since they were not available on time.
Looking ahead, programme management activities should adopt a more top-down approach and begin earlier in the implementation cycle. This could help mitigate delays in the future, especially in the case of more complex projects.
In many cases, managing organisational change was not straightforward. Technology upgrades required significant effort from stakeholders, both in terms of training and managing organisational change. In December 2026, SESAR DM aims to organise a change management workshop for stakeholders interested in upgrading their systems in the near future. Lessons learned will be shared and participants will have the opportunity to gain practical insights into managing complex change programmes.
Another important consideration is the current geopolitical environment. European ATM infrastructure is increasingly viewed as critical infrastructure that must be resilient and capable of supporting both civil and military operations.
Building consensus among many stakeholders with different priorities
Managing a diverse range of stakeholders is central to the work of SESAR Deployment Manager. The organisation brings together different approaches to ATM, diverse organisational cultures and varying operational realities. The most important thing is to create a trust framework. Trust creates openness and makes it easier to find compromises and build consensus.
Consultation processes are designed to ensure that the needs and concerns of all stakeholders are heard, considered and as far as possible taken into account. There are cases where there are different priorities, but understanding these different situations is necessary. For instance, countries located at the eastern side of the European Union need to deal with reduced traffic because of airspace closures and increased military air mobility activities. This shows that there are also several external conditions we need to take into account while working together towards the same modernisation goal.
The importance of people
Mariagrazia emphasised that one of the key factors behind successfully leading such a complex programme has been the support and commitment of her team. “One of the best investments we have made has been the investment in people.”
When a culture of open exchange is established, people listen to one another, share knowledge and inspire each other. The opportunity to draw on the expertise of so many professionals and continuously learn from one another has been an important source of personal and professional enrichment.
*Air Navigation Service Providers (ANSPs) receiving EU funding in support of modernisation investments have to adjust their route charges to avoid double-funding.
