An interesting idea that one of the world's top airports, which is already bursting at the seams with passenger luggage, can add another 40% capacity with no new construction.
This is the challenge that computer giant IBM says it will be able to solve over the next few years after being hired by Amsterdam Schiphol airport to improve systems for the eye-watering levels of luggage that pass through the airport every day.
The Dutch airport currently handles around 140,000 bags a day, often rising to 180,000, but officials there want to increase the volume to around 70 million a year.
The problem they have is that the airport cannot be extended any further physically, so capacity has to come from within the bulging system itself.
Now IBM is claiming it can do exactly that with a massively overhauled system that effectively utilises the existing space and technological infrastructure to make it more efficient, all part of a four-year contract between it and Schiphol's management.
This kind of challenge is nothing new to the likes of SITA and other travel-focused technology suppliers, for example, but the appointment is one of the biggest major infrastructure projects awarded to IBM since it laid out plans for a strategic push to target the sector in May 2010.
With other airports probably facing similar challenges in the coming years, especially those in countries were planning restrictions effectively curtail any ideas of expansion, expect IBM and perhaps others outside the existing aviation technology sector to zero in on the commercial opportunity.
Here is a (PR-driven, but still interesting in terms of the challenge) clip:
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GU3J5Yl2snA