Open Integrated Modular Avionic (IMA): State of the Art and future Development Road Map at Airbus Deutschland Henning Butz Department of Avionic Systems at Airbus Deutschland GmbH Kreetslag 10, D-21129 Hamburg, Germany Email: henning.butz@airbus.com Tel: (+49) 40 743 73653 Abstract Electronic sets operated on aircraft generally are summarized as “avionic = aviation electronic equip- ment”. The first avionic devices that had been applied on aircraft were radios for communication and navigation some 70 years ago. Forty years later analog and digital electronic controllers began to re- place mechanical aircraft functions and equipment. Since those years the airline demand for more and smarter functionality on modern aircraft systems pushed an exponential request for avionic perform- ance. Finally the classical concept: one function = one computer could not longer be maintained. In the early nineties air framers and system suppliers developed concepts where multiple software (SW) functions of different criticality level were integrated on single avionic computing devices in order to keep the volume, weight, power consumption and cost of avionic within reasonable limits. However, multi function integration on a single processor leads to in-transparent fault propagation, which sig- nificantly turns the reliability of the controllers down and maintenance cost up. Modifications and upgrades became a nightmare. A new concept - labeled “Integrated Modular Avionic (IMA)”, first presented by Honeywell for cock- pit functions on the Boeing 777 aircraft in 1995 - brought the solution. It featured a modularized cabi- net packaging with time triggered back plane data communication and an Application Program Inter- face (API) middleware with specific services for strong SW/SW partitioning, for HW/SW segregation, precise fault monitoring, on board SW loading etc. The IMA concept proved to meet the performance, reliability and flexibility requirements for highly integrated avionic systems as desired. Today IMA cabinets can be provided from different avionic suppliers. IMA is standard on many new aircraft and helicopter programs. In Europe Airbus together with THALES-DIEHL took a further step in order to develop an “Open IMA” technology concept for the A380 program: While maintaining the a. m. IMA segregation fea- tures and API services the proprietary cabinet and back plane solutions were abandoned. On the A380 ARINC 600 Standard avionic boxes were chosen to host the generalpurpose controllers, labeled CPIOM (Core Processing & IO Module). Further an “Aircraft Full DupleX (AFDX)” 100Mbit switched Ethernet data communication network was provided to connect all CPIOM and other com- puting devices on the aircraft. Ethernet switches and CPIOM are designed according to the common aeronautic ARINC standards and thus, are open to all potential avionic manufacturers. On the A380 the standard CPIOM are applied to both, cockpit and utility functions, i.e. quite across all aircraft system domains. Due to the concept of Open IMA the development responsibility for systems and functions remains at the system manufacturers. Airbus acts as the Integrator, putting together the CPIOM with all the application SW that is provided by different system suppliers. This is a new and complex industrial process, which demands for new methods and tools. The paper gives a survey on the state of the art of the A380 Open IMA concept in terms of technical aspects and with a strong focus on the means and process features of this technology (configuration, incremental qualification, tools, industrial roles & responsibilities, liabilities etc.). Finally – derived from the Lessons learnt – a roadmap towards further needs and targets will be given. Key words: Integrated Modular Avionic (IMA), Open IMA, CPIOM, AFDX Ethernet, incremental qualification, open avionic architecture, strong partitioning