Network Manager business-to-business web services

The NM B2B Services constitute an interface provided by the EUROCONTROL Network Manager (NM) for system-to-system access to its services and data, allowing users to retrieve and use the information in their own systems.

The NM B2B services are at the core of the NM Interoperability Strategy and follow the Single European Sky Aviation Research (SESAR) and the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) System-Wide Information Management (SWIM) principles, being instrumental in achieving real-time information exchange at global level and implementing collaborative global air traffic flow and capacity management (ATFCM).

The NM B2B services are available mainly to air navigation service providers (ANSP), aircraft operators (AO), airports, ground handling agents, computerised flight plan service providers (CFSP) and airspace management cells (AMC).

The NM B2B Services enable building an open ATM digital collaborative environment by:

• providing real-time network situational awareness and supporting collaborative decision making (CDM) processes;
• supporting the stakeholders’ transitions to SWIM;
• unlocking ATM data and contributing to accelerate ATM digitalisation and modernisation;
• supporting the implementation of the SESAR Deployment Programme and the CP1 IR - Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) No 2021/116.

The benefits of such an open ATM digital collaborative environment include data quality and accuracy, timeliness of information, process simplification and automation, cost-efficiency, operational-efficiency and safety.

The available NM B2B Services support operations in several domains, and include: 

Flight services

• Flight Plan Preparation
  includes route generation and flight plan validation; it provides services for preparation of a flight plan, before filing it to NM, including information about the potential impact of the flow measures on the flight; proposes a complete rerouting assistance service by applying the tried or generated route;
• Flight Plan Management
  provides multiple functions to support initial flight plan filing, flight plan updates, cancellations and associated operations, such as rejecting a rerouting proposal;
• Flight Data Retrieval
  provides services to query and retrieve information on flights plans and flights data (lists and details);
• Departure Planning Information (DPI)
  provides services for CDM Airports and Advanced Tower systems to send departure planning information to NM;
• Arrival Planning Information (API)
  provides services for the submission of target times (and other arrival information) in support of the arrival management processes;
• ATFCM slot related messages
  provides services for the management of the flight readiness or confirming it into a regulation;
• Flight Update information
  provides services allowing the submission of airborne flight information to NM (e.g., First System Activation message type);
• Flight and Flow Information for a Collaborative Environment (FF-ICE)
  supports the ICAO FF-ICE/R1 filing, trial, flight data request and data publication services, and includes the distribution of flight plans to ANSPs.

Airspace services

• Airspace structure - provides access to the most up-to date and consistent view of NM operational airspace data using AIXM 5.1.1 with an NM-specific extension (the ADR extension): 
  • Aeronautical Information Publication (AIP) sourced data (Points, Routes, Aerodromes and Airspaces) including changes resulting from NOTAM implementation and European Airspace Use Plan / European Updated Airspace Use Plan (EAUP/EUUP) implementation; the airspace data made available via this service is not the officially published AIP data, but the NM view of it, adapted for the purpose and constraints of the NM flight and flow systems;
  • ATFCM related airspace data, such as restrictions, including route availability document (RAD) and profile tuning restrictions;
• Airspace availability - provides access to: 
  • electronic Airspace Management Information (e-AMI), for access to the EAUP/EUUP in AIXM 5.1.1 with the ADR extension;
  • FUA service for the management of the AUP/UUP in AIXM 5.1.1 with the ADR extension.

Flow services

• Regulation list
  provides access to all the regulation information used in the NM flow management systems;
• ATFCM situation
  provides information on the Network Situation (traffic, delays, delay causes and regulations) at a given time;
• Traffic counts
  provides services to query and retrieve traffic counts by aerodrome, aircraft operator, point, traffic volume and airspace;
• ATFCM tactical updates
  provides services to manage ATFCM daily plan elements such as, capacity plan, occupancy traffic monitoring values (OTMV) plan, runway configuration plan, sector configuration plan, traffic volume activation plan and restriction activation plan;
• Measures management
  provides services to manage regulation proposals, re-routings and regulations, both normal and cherry-pick regulations;
• Scenario management
  provides services to access ATFCM scenarios;
• Simulations
  provides access to simulation capabilities, allowing to perform network impact assessment of ATFCM measures;
• Measure Collaboration Decision Making (MCDM)
  allows coordination at 3 levels, giving the possibility to comment/approve/reject decisions: 
  • on measures;
  • on flights in the context of a measure;
  • on individual flights via eHelpdesk tickets, e.g., slot improvement, slot extension, exclusion from regulation, slot swap, request for information.

General information services

• ATFM Information Messages (AIM)
  for accessing the general Network Operations information, as published in the AIMs;
• NM B2B Info
  access to NM B2B documents, WSDL, XSD, Release Notes, examples.

Publish and subscribe services

The publish/subscribe services allow to subscribe to a topic (such as ATFCM Regulations, Flight Plans Flight Data, etc.) and to receive asynchronous messages published on that topic. Various parameters are available to fine-tune the subscriptions, in order to select the messages that the user is interested in and to configure the information to be sent in each message. The publish/subscribe services include:

• Subscription management
  services available in request/reply to allow the creation and management of subscriptions;
• Message consumption
  services allowing the client to consume the messages via a message broker over AMQP 1.0.

SWIM Compliance

The NM B2B Services are compliant with the European Union Implementing Regulation No 2021/116 Common Project One (CP1) ATM Functionality AF5/SWIM, including the conformance with the EUROCONTROL Specifications for SWIM, and the publication in the European SWIM Registry.

For interoperability reasons, the NM B2B Services are based on open standards and main stream web technologies that do not require the installation of any NM software at the customer side, in conformance with the EUROCONTROL Specifications for SWIM.

The NM B2B Services support two communication paradigms:

• Request/Reply – SOAP Web Services and POX (Plain Old XML); WSDL 1.1 and SOAP 1.1.
• Publish/Subscribe – AMQP 1.0.

The payload is always XML. Standard exchange formats are used, when available. This is the case for the Airspace Services, which use AIXM 5.1.1, and for the FF-ICE Services, which use FIXM 4.2. All services make use of TLS.

The NM B2B Services Reference Manuals provide the detailed information of the services, their interfaces and exchange models. With this information, the customer can then develop the software that uses, in a standard way, these services and integrate them within their systems.

The NM B2B Services are accessible via Internet and via NewPENS. Confidentiality and security are guaranteed by a strong authentication mechanism (using digital certificates – PKI), by the use of secure Internet protocols and by the NM security related processes and technical infrastructure.

Access via NewPENS ensures an additional level of security and availability.

An organisation profile concept is used to define and manage which NM B2B Services can be accessed by each type of organisation. CFSP and ground handling agents are required to demonstrate their direct implication in ATFM operations to have access to the NM B2B Services.

Access to the Flight Plan Filing NM B2B Service requires a high level of quality in the flight plans submitted (automatic pass rate above 95%, with a minimum of 30 flight plans filed on different city-pairs).

Access to the NM B2B Services is subject to eligibility and usage conditions, outlined in various agreement types.

NM B2B Services are accessible via a set of packages defined by the operational stakeholder profile: AO, ANSP, CFSP, airport, ground handling agent and AMC.

NM B2B Services interfaces are accessible 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

Service levels vary depending on the interface concerned.

Service levels do not include:

• communication networks used to access the product;
• interruptions due to installation or use of product which does not conform to NM specifications;
• periods of planned outage and essential maintenance.

EUROCONTROL endeavours to keep service interruptions to a minimum. When planned maintenance and testing require the service to be interrupted, EUROCONTROL notifies the user at least 48 hours in advance. In all other cases, it provides such notice as soon as reasonably practicable.

For Operational Systems, technical assistance is provided 24 hours a day, 7 days a week for first level support, and from 07h00 to 22h00 (Brussels time) for 2^nd level support.

For Pre-Operational (Pre-OPS) Systems, support is provided from 09h00 – 17h00 (Brussels time) with no guarantee on the response time.

For the NM B2B Services, EUROCONTROL provides one pre-operational environment certificate (for supporting software development & validation), followed by one operational environment certificate (activated only after the customer has successfully executed the NM acceptance validation processes). Each certificate is valid for three years. The user is responsible for requesting replacement certificates no later than two months before they expire. Requests need to be made through the NM Service Request form.

A light charging scheme is in place for accessing NM B2B Services. The first two certificates are provided free of charge per location, subsequent ones (if any) will be charged 200€ per certificate. A new charging scheme is currently under consideration and development, for roll out in 2022/23.

EUROCONTROL reserves the right to charge a contribution fee when renewing the certificates with new technologies.

Invoices are payable within 30 days from the date of their receipt by the user. Access is granted after full payment of the invoice.

EUROCONTROL reserves the right to cancel user accounts not used for over six months, for efficiency and security reasons. Should you require a new user account after this cancellation, you will have to submit a new request that will be charged.