Every supplier, categorised and ranked — from public sources, explained in detail.
Aviation Souk indexes 833+ aviation suppliers across 20 procurement categories and 15 GCC airports. This page documents exactly how we source the data, classify it, verify it, and decide what ranks where. No fabrication. Auditable methodology.
Where the data comes from.
Every supplier profile is compiled from public sources only. No scraping behind logins, no leaked contracts, no paywalled databases. The specific sources, in order of priority:
- Supplier-published materials — company websites, published product datasheets, case studies, press releases, annual reports. These are the single biggest source of structured spec, certification and installation data.
- GCC airport and airline disclosures — published operator press releases, tender-award notices, supplier citations in airport annual reports, master-plan documents (DXB Airports master plan, Qatar Airways Group annual report, GACA disclosures, NEOM tender announcements).
- Regulatory and standards body filings — ICAO document annexes, ECAC Doc 30 certification registers, ACI Europe / ACI Asia-Pacific member lists, Companies House (UK), SEC filings (US), equivalent corporate registers in DE, FR, NL.
- Trade-press coverage — Runway Girl Network, Airport World, Airport Industry Review, Passenger Terminal Today, Future Travel Experience. Used to cross-reference contract awards and deployment dates.
- Specialist supplier directories— airport-suppliers.com, aviationpros.com Buyer’s Guide, Inter Airport Expo exhibitor lists, Dubai Airshow exhibitor catalogues. Used to find long-tail suppliers outside the primes.
- Direct supplier submissions— when a company claims its listing (paid or free tier), the data they submit via the intake form becomes authoritative and overrides the auto-compiled version. Flagged as “Edited by supplier” on the profile page.
How each supplier gets tagged.
Every supplier is assigned one or more of 20procurement categories. The category list was built bottom-up from actual GCC airport tenders published 2020–2026 — we didn’t invent categories, we derived them from what operators actually procure.
Suppliers map to categories based on:
- Their own published product catalogue — if Smiths Detection lists X-ray scanners, they map to
security-screening - Category-specific keyword matching against descriptions, flagship products, and trade-press coverage
- Manual editorial review for suppliers spanning multiple categories (e.g. Collins Aerospace: airport IT + tactical comms + defence avionics)
- A catchall
other-aviation-suppliercategory for companies we couldn’t confidently classify — these don’t appear in category landing pages
Wrong classification? Reply to any hello@aviationsouk.com thread or submit a correction. We action within 48 hours.
How the AI decides what goes in a top-3 shortlist.
When a buyer asks our AI a procurement question, the top-3 shortlist is determined by a two-stage process:
Our matchQueryengine scores every supplier against the buyer’s brief by: category match (+30 per matching category), airport match (+20 per cited GCC airport the buyer mentioned), token overlap on product / description / flagship-product text (+8 per matching keyword), Gulf tenure (+5 if 10+ years), certification density (+1 each), and a direct-competitor boost if the buyer named a specific product / supplier. The top 12 candidates go to Stage 2.
The 12 candidates + their structured data (HQ, certifications, GCC airport citations, flagship products, yearsInGulf) are passed to a large language model. The LLM applies reasoning the keyword matcher can’t — matching on technical specs, compatibility hints, budget constraints, compliance requirements — and produces a final top 3 with per-supplier reasoning, strengths, drawbacks, and a “bestFor” summary.
Paid Verified / Featured / Dominant suppliers get a ranking bonus (+10 / +20 / +30 respectively) applied in Stage 1. This is declared openly — every profile page displays the tier badge. The LLM still writes honest drawbacks even for high-tier suppliers. We never fabricate facts to favour paid suppliers.
What’s verified and what isn’t.
Auto-compiled from public sources. Not independently verified. Profile carries an explicit UNCLAIMED badge. Most of the 833 indexed profiles are currently in this state.
Supplier has completed intake form + domain-email verification (we email a one-time link to an address matching their website domain). Their data overrides the auto-compiled version. Profile shows “Edited by supplier”.
Verified + category exclusivity. We do manual due-diligence on Dominant claims to ensure the supplier genuinely operates in the category they claim. One Dominant per category in any GCC country.
We do not verify every claim in every profile. We do not audit supplier financials. We do not independently confirm contract values. When a supplier says they’re installed at DXB, we note it as such — sometimes citing the supplier’s own case study, sometimes a third-party press mention. The source URL where available is in our internal record; we can provide it on request (email hello@aviationsouk.com).
How to fix something.
Spotted something wrong on a profile? Any of three paths:
- Quick correction — use the correction form. We action within 48 hours.
- Claim the profile — via free intake (10 min, edit access after verification) or Founding Supplier (permanent priority, $1,500/yr).
- Takedown request — if you’re listed and want to be delisted entirely, email hello@aviationsouk.com. We honour this within 48 hours, no questions.
Where we could be biased, and what we do about it.
Still have questions about the data?
Email hello@aviationsouk.com — the founder (Liam Walsh) reads every message personally.