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In the heart of Texas, Dallas Fort Worth International Airport (DFW) is a dynamic ecosystem of infrastructure, technology, and people. This third busiest airport in the world faces the constant challenge of maintaining operational excellence while managing a vast and complex physical environment. To meet these demands, DFW embarked on a multi-year initiative to revolutionize its maintenance planning and scheduling process.
Beyond a technology upgrade, this transformation represents a cultural shift toward data-driven decision-making, proactive maintenance, and continuous improvement. The goal is ambitious: Achieve 25% operational efficiency, 20–45% productivity gains, and 20% energy savings. At the core of this journey lies a structured, six-step maintenance process, now digitally empowered by Willow.
DFW’s facilities span over 17,000 acres, with thousands of assets ranging from HVAC systems and lighting to baggage handling and security infrastructure. Historically, maintenance was reactive, siloed, and paper-based. This led to inefficiencies, unplanned downtime, and missed opportunities for optimization. Recognizing the need for a smarter, more integrated approach, DFW turned to Willow to help digitize and streamline its maintenance operations. This partnership marked the beginning of a comprehensive change management initiative; one that would align people, processes, and technology around a shared vision of operational excellence. Kelly Watt, Program Manager for Digital Twins at DFW, shares how Willow is enabling change management.
Willow’s digital twin platform is the foundation for DFW’s transformation. By creating a virtual replica of the airport’s physical assets, Willow enables real-time visibility into asset health, maintenance history, and performance trends. This digital layer is empowering teams to make informed decisions, prioritize work effectively, and shift from reactive to predictive maintenance. To make this endeavor a success, DFW realized that they needed change management: a structured approach that engages stakeholders, redefines workflows, and promotes new behaviors across the organization.
At the heart of DFW’s operational transformation is a reimagined Maintenance Planning and Scheduling Process, now supported by Willow’s platform. Shown below, it consists of six key steps.
The journey begins with identifying and prioritizing maintenance needs. Leveraging data and insights generated by the knowledge graph, DFW’s teams can now detect issues early, whether it’s a temperature anomaly in an HVAC unit or a disconnected Passenger Boarding Bridge. Teams log, categorize and prioritize preventative as well as corrective work orders based on criticality, asset condition, and operational impact. Willow then integrates with CMMS systems like HxGN and Maintenance Connection to facilitate the workflow. This step ensures the team addresses the most important tasks first, reducing the risk of unexpected failures and service disruptions.
After identifying and prioritizing tasks, the planning phase kicks in. Here, Maintenance Planners use Willow’s insights to determine the root cause of problems and provide detailed direction for resolution. Willow runs a series of diagnostics and comprehensive results showing passed as well as failed diagnostics that provide a lot more clarity than previously available. KPIs like Avoidable Cost allow for prioritization in planning, which means addressing the $500 impact over the issue with $5 impact. Willow integrates with traditional CMMS systems, which enables an understanding of the scope of work, estimating the cost of labor and materials, and preparing job plans.
Identifying the top problematic assets and visualization of alerts and tickets in Willow’s spatial models allows DFW to review outstanding work orders on assets in close proximity. Preventative maintenance and corrective tasks can be bundled for efficiency, minimizing asset downtime and technician travel. Digital planning also enables better coordination with vendors and internal teams, ensuring that all resources align before work begins.
With plans in place, the next step is scheduling. DFW uses a long-term scheduling horizon to balance workload, resource availability, and operational constraints. Scheduling tools create a unified calendar that aligns maintenance with flight schedules, terminal access, and other airport activities. Willow helps optimize with features like automated ticket generation. Insights that must always be actioned are configured to auto-generate work orders that flow into the scheduling process. This integrated approach reduces conflicts, improves technician utilization, and ensures that maintenance is performed at the optimal time.
As Technicians are scheduled, they receive digital work orders on mobile devices, complete with insight details, asset history, recommended steps, and safety protocols. Real-time updates allow Facility Managers and coordinators to monitor progress, reassign tasks if needed, and respond to emergencies without disrupting the broader schedule.
As work orders are completed, Technicians start documenting log time, materials used, and follow-up actions. A templated set of questions ensures that enough detail is entered into the work order’s Solution field. Willow Copilot helps summarize all troubleshooting steps and how issues were resolved. The data feeds back to enrich asset history. This supports future capital planning and analysis, informing repair vs replace decisions. Rich details in closed work orders improve data quality, laying the groundwork for continuous improvement.
DFW’s maintenance leaders use dashboards and analytics to track performance metrics, identify trends, and uncover root causes of recurring issues. Insights from Willow inform strategic decisions. CMMS and other integrations in Willow help track vendor performance and training needs. This feedback loop drives a culture of learning and improvement, ensuring that the maintenance process evolves with the airport’s needs.
Implementing this new process demanded technology updates as well as a comprehensive change management strategy. DFW has completely evolved processes to engage stakeholders across departments, from Facility Management and IT to Finance and Operations. Now, all teams train staff in new tools and workflows, using hands-on sessions and digital learning modules. By redesigning roles and responsibilities to support the new process, DFW is building momentum. Establishing governance structures to monitor progress and resolve issues along with celebrating quick wins reinforces the value of change. This human-centric approach ensures embracing the transformation instead of resisting it.
While the journey is ongoing, the results are already tangible:
Most importantly, DFW has built a foundation for long-term resilience; one that can adapt to future challenges and opportunities.
DFW’s partnership with Willow highlights how airports and large infrastructure operators can harness digital twin technology to drive meaningful change. By centering the transformation around a clear process, engaging people at every level, and leveraging the power of Willow’s Knowledge Graph, Activate Technology, and Willow Copilot, DFW is redefining what’s possible in maintenance operations. As the airport continues to grow and evolve, the maintenance strategy remains a cornerstone of success, ensuring that every flight, passenger, and asset is supported by a world-class operational backbone.