System-wide information management

The System Wide Information Management (SWIM) concept consists of standards, infrastructure and governance enabling the management of ATM related information and its exchange between qualified parties via interoperable services (ICAO Doc.10039).

SWIM enables seamless information access and interchange between all providers and users of ATM information and services. It takes information management business practices from the ICT sector, such as Service-Oriented Architecture (SOA) and the use of open standards and web technologies, and it applies them to ATM.

The SOA approach ensures the availability of interoperable, reusable and user-driven information services. The use of open standards and main-stream web technologies reduces the costs of interoperability and makes the aviation data market more competitive, allowing users to choose a provider without a major impact on their systems.

At EUROCONTROL, we support the development and implementation of SWIM in relation to:

• information services
• information and technical infrastructure
• developing standards and supporting material
• governance
• civil-military cooperation

We offer our expertise to the ICAO Information Management Panel (IMP) and we support ICAO’s work on elaborating provisions and guidance material for the global application of SWIM. We do this in close coordination with our Member States and with other European stakeholder organisations, including the European Commission (EC), the European Union Safety Agency (EASA), the SESAR Joint Undertaking (SJU) and the SESAR Deployment Manager (SDM).

In the framework of the SESAR 2020 programme, EUROCONTROL contributes to research projects focused on the industry-related aspects of SWIM. In particular, we contribute to research on air-to-ground information exchanges and on dynamic interactions between operational systems.

As a civil-military organisation, we contribute to ground-to-ground civil military information-sharing projects, incorporating military requirements for SWIM-based information exchanges into our projects.

As part of our industry-wide deployment efforts, we have taken steps to further specify the common standards for SWIM in Europe, in line with the ICAO SWIM Concept and with research carried out in the SESAR 1 research programme.

We published and are continuously updating four SWIM specifications. Our review process ensures that these remain relevant to our stakeholders and are in line with the most recent trends in information management. These specifications also contain supporting material and information management artefacts, such as the ATM Information Reference Model (AIRM).

You can find the latest versions of our SWIM specifications below.

We have set up a reference website where our stakeholders can find support material related to the EUROCONTROL SWIM specifications and the ICAO Information Management Panel work on SWIM.

Complementary to the reference website, a collaborative online space holds the upcoming support material subject to on-going reviews by the SWIM Community of Interest.

If you would like to become a member, please submit a request using the contact form on this page.

We developed factsheets to answer frequently asked questions about a number of SWIM topics. They make key SWIM concepts more concrete and provide a means for technical experts and management to get a quick understanding of SWIM. 

The topics covered by the factsheets:

• SWIM - an introduction to what SWIM is.
• SWIM technical infrastructure - an introduction to the technical infrastructure and the yellow profile.
• SWIM service descriptions - an introduction to service descriptions and what they do.
• SWIM service registry - an introduction to the concept of registries and why we need them.
• ATM Information Reference Model (AIRM) - an introduction to the AIRM.

Military participation in SWIM governance structures is vital.

Recurring stakeholder and military questions on the emergence of SWIM require a guarantee that published information respects the relevant formats and quality of service levels. This includes not only the confidentiality, integrity and availability of information but also of attributes such as quality, liability and validity. Other issues include technical connectivity challenges as well as security and management/governance processes.

These questions have to be addressed by military and stakeholders with the appropriate level of awareness of SWIM matters.

Closer coordination of SWIM developments with military organisations is vital. Their requirements, associated with information exchange needs in Air Traffic Management (ATM) and Air Defence, will be covered by SWIM-related research, as well as deployment and standardisation initiatives.