An aviation company is trying out paperless technology.
With most businesses aware of their environmental footprint as well as eager to save money in their day-to-day operations, paperless technology is cropping up in more and more industries.
The latest is aviation, with one company announcing that it is to swap all its flight-deck documents used by pilots and other professionals for digitised versions carried on tablet computers.
TAG Aviation UK is the first company to get permission to do this from the Civil Aviation Authority and many more could follow suit if it proves to be a success, Corporate Jet Investor reports.
All the applications needed for flight that would normally be found in paper documents will be pre-loaded onto iPads, which will then be distributed among staff.
This should make it easy for them to carry on their jobs seamlessly, as well as increasing productivity by saving them time in the long term.
TAG Aviation UK should also save a significant sum of money through not having to print out so much paperwork and not having to carry weighty documents onboard flights, which uses up a lot of fuel.
Once this trial has been completed, the firm expects to roll out paperless technology in Switzerland, Spain, the Middle East and Asia.
Vice president of flight operations Europe at TAG Aviation Russ Allchorne commented: "The introduction of paperless technology will ensure that pilots have up-to-date, essential information at their fingertips. Flights manuals, manufacturer’s documents and aeronautical flight charts can be updated at the touch of a button instead of the time-consuming and wasteful process of manually updating hard copies."
A host of other companies have also been trying out paperless systems lately. For example, carmaker Citroen worked with designers to produce a virtual brochure for its new DS3 Cabrio instead of relying on traditional catalogues.
This has saved it money and also made the document more accessible, AM-Online reported.
Virgin Holidays is also to open two paperless holiday laboratories in the UK this summer, Travel Weekly reports.