Headquartered in Houston, Texas, with hubs in Cleveland, Newark and Houston, Continental Airlines flies to 286 destinations worldwide and carried more than 67 million passengers in 2006. Continental is the fourth-largest US airline. It is focused on continually improving its environmental performance and has initiatives in place across the organization to improve fuel efficiency, reduce emissions and follow “green” building practices.

The Challenge: Save Forests with Paperless Maintenance Procedures

One of Continental’s environmental initiatives centered on its maintenance operations. “We wanted to move to a wireless system for aircraft turnarounds and maintenance checks to save huge amounts of paper every year,” said Ricky Caldwell, systems engineer. “We worked with our partner, Panasonic, which built Toughbook CF-08 wireless slates for our maintenance people to carry around with them.” To make its in-house maintenance application, which connects to a Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) database, available on the Toughbook devices, Continental looked for a solution that could provide a seamless application delivery experience to the end user.

Implementing a Citrix Application Delivery Infrastructure Solution

After considering several solutions, Continental implemented Citrix Presentation Server™ with Microsoft® Windows Server® 2003 for virtualized application delivery to the wireless Toughbook devices. Toughbook CF-08s support the Citrix application virtualization protocol. “The rollout was very easy for us,” recalled Caldwell. “It was a very fast integration. Citrix Presentation Server allowed us to do the first FAA-approved wireless turn and wireless maintenance on an aircraft.” Later, this solution was expanded to deliver maintenance manuals to the devices as well.

Based on the success of this program, Continental decided to leverage Citrix Presentation Server for application delivery to home-based workers. “We moved into a very popular program called ‘Res Anywhere,’ which enabled many of our reservations agents to start working from home,” he said. “Our aim was to deliver the same application experience they would have in the actual reservation center itself. Now the Res Anywhere agents have become the largest overnight Reservation Center with no outsourcing.” Allowing agents to work from home helps Continental’s environmental effort by reducing fuel consumption from commuting and also reducing the power and overhead required to support large physical call centers.

Currently, Continental delivers a number of mission-critical applications, including the aircraft maintenance solution, Microsoft® Office 2007, an IP phone system from Avaya, and its in-house reservations system, as well as Web applications. About 2,000 reservations agents work from home and connect to the Citrix Presentation Server environment over the Web using Web Interface functionality. Approximately 500 maintenance staff in Houston, Cleveland and Newark use the Toughbook CF-08 slates, connecting over a Cisco wireless WAN.

Recently, Continental upgraded to Citrix Presentation Server, Platinum Edition to leverage such capabilities as Application Isolation environments on the server and application performance monitoring for insight into the end-user experience, which is powered by Citrix EdgeSight™.

Enhancing Corporate Commitment to the Environment

One of the main benefits of the Citrix application delivery solution is support for Continental’s drive to reduce its impact on the environment. “Citrix has helped us become a greener airline, and we pride ourselves on that,” noted Caldwell. “Our management has estimated we save one and a half million sheets of paper a year by using the wireless slates for maintenance turnarounds and checks. And we are reducing environmental impacts such as fuel consumption through home working, while also saving on overhead and infrastructure costs.” Continental has received a number of accolades for its pro-environment stance, including being named by Fortune magazine as one of 10 “Green Giants” –- corporations whose environmental policies go beyond the status quo.

Improving Employee Productivity and Satisfaction

Another key benefit of Presentation Server is an improved work experience for employees. Application delivery on handheld devices helps Continental’s technical operations employees boost their efficiency. “Those folks definitely enjoy being able to use a wireless PC versus having to fill out everything on paper, then go back to the office to drop off the documents and pick up a new set, plus carry a bulky service manual out to each plane,” Caldwell said. With applications delivered via Presentation Server, the mechanics can complete a maintenance checklist and provide a digital signature on the wireless device.

“One funny story is how the mechanics put the rugged Toughbooks to the test by tossing them around the hangar while a live Citrix session was running. The devices really held up –- and so did the Citrix session. They would throw the device, watch as it bounced, pick it up and finish their work. Or they could pick up a different device and, with Citrix session reliability, begin where they left off on the previous Toughbook. We cringed a bit to see the Panasonic CF-08s flying through the air, but it was nice to see that Citrix still maintained that session for them.” The session reliability feature allows work items to remain open when network connectivity is lost, and then seamlessly resume when connectivity is restored.

For the Res Anywhere agents, application delivery at home has been “a very big success,” according to Caldwell. “The use of Citrix Presentation Server provides agents with a complete, seamless desktop on their home computer. They feel like they’re sitting in the reservation center. In fact, we’ve had comments from agents that they really forget they’re at home sometimes, until they notice they’re still in pajamas.” Thanks to the great enthusiasm for Res Anywhere, the airline expects the number of agents to grow by 25 percent over the next year, to about 3,000 agents.

Future Plans

Continental continues to expand its Citrix Application Delivery Infrastructure solution to include new users, functions and applications. Caldwell noted, “On the technical operations side, we plan to add cargo and baggage handling applications to the Citrix implementation. Our own IT organization has begun using Presentation Server to work from home.” Application Support employees and others will be able to do their work from their home office as well.

“When our IT organization decides on a solution, we look at high-level value, cost-savings potential and return on investment — and of course, support for our green effort. Citrix is a solution that brings value to the enterprise, our employees and the environment,” Caldwell concluded.

©2008 Citrix Systems, Inc. All rights reserved. Citrix®, Citrix Presentation Server™ and Citrix EdgeSight™ are trademarks or registered trademarks of Citrix Systems, Inc. and/or one or more of its subsidiaries, and may be registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office and in other countries. Microsoft®, Windows® and Windows Server® are registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation in the U.S. and/or other countries. All other trademarks and registered trademarks are property of their respective owners.