Air Canada has become one of the Americas’ most tech-forward airlines, boasting a cutting-edge digital strategy that includes in-app bag tracking, website redevelopment, and AI implementation.

Chief Digital Officer Firas Al Osman believes the philosophy underpinning Air Canada’s strategy is what sets it apart. With the app nominated at World Aviation Festival’s Battle of the Airline Apps 2025, he says that a holistic approach encompassing the entire customer journey has been critical to achieving success.

The app is more than just a travel companion. We’re trying to make it intuitive enough, useful enough to be used even beyond the day of travel.

Air Canada’s app boasts a range of impressive features, from boarding notifications to seamless integration with the 90-plus partners on the Aeroplan loyalty programme. In the future, Al Osman sees AI as key to advancing Air Canada’s digital strategy, although he believes airlines need to get the basics right to embed tech into workflows rather than creating isolated use cases.

I would argue that many organisations haven’t been able to see true value from AI because they’ve not invested in modernising their data, in driving a huge push towards the Cloud in a meaningful way.

One area that Al Osman and his team are working on is automation for disruption management, so that if flights are delayed customer claims can be processed automatically. This will relieve pressure on the airline while providing a more frictionless experience. But as the Canadian government expands the use of digital IDs for travel, cybersecurity remains an imperative for all of Air Canada’s digital products.

The question is less about technology. The question or the challenge is really how do we build trust and how do we make sure that it’s built into the fabric of our regulations and our policies.

🎥 Watch the interview to hear Firas Al Osman’s full thoughts on advancing Air Canada’s digital strategy.

Questions asked include:

  • What do customers expect from a modern airline app?
  • Can we separate hype from reality and identify effective use cases for AI?
  • What kind of challenges and opportunities are there in digital IDs?
  • Which technologies are ‘ones to watch’ in the future?

Join us at Aviation Festival Americas 2026, where we’ll be joined by Jose Platero, Director Digital Product and Design at Air Canada.

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