Recently in In-flight Entertainment/Communications Category

There I was, skipping down an aisle at the Dubai air show, and who should I spy but my friends at EMS. Hadn't I just visited with these nice folks at WAEA in Palm Springs? Why yes, but we sat and a little chat anyways because, even in the heat of an air show, I've got IFEC on my mind.

Here's a pic of our gathering. I know the lighting casts halos on their heads, but fear not, EMS is not the second coming. They are, however, saints for taking time out of their busy schedule to talk to me.



   

Hats off to Aircell for taking advantage of the momentum behind the Dubai air show (#DXB09) by announcing a new sales and service rep for the Middle East.

Shoukry Shokralla will be responsible for supporting existing operators of Aircell's SwiftBroadband (SBB)-supported, Thrane & Thrane-powered airborne connectivity solution, which the US firm believes is well suited for the region. He will also assist prospective customers with their needs.

Unlike other SBB connectivity providers, which largely focus on in-flight mobile phone calls, messaging and email, Aircell focuses on offering "e-mail and light Internet services" for the business jet community. Telephone calls are made over Aircell's Axxess integrated cabin handsets.
 
In the USA, Aircell's main business, both in commercial and business aviation, is centered on its air-to-ground (ATG)-based high-speed Internet system.

But will Aircell start offering a similar SBB solution to the commercial sector? I wonder if Aircell's international airline customers, such as American, Delta, United and US Airways, wouldn't be well-placed to consider offering SBB on overseas flights.

Hey, British Airways is already doing it via an agreement with OnAir!!!
 

 

A number of journa-bloggers have tried British Airways' new transatlantic Airbus A318 service between London City airport and New York JFK. But few have broken down the experience in a really in-depth fashion.

That's why I asked Plane Talking, the self-described "fuelling aviation conversation" web site, to write a guest blog and describe what it was like to fly this unique bird.

There is lots of good stuff in here, including an assessment of BA's procedure for handing out portable media players (supplied by IMS).

Private Jet Anyone?

It was a late Wednesday evening when I made my way to the British Airways Terrace Lounge at JFK. As I provided my flight number to the lady behind the reception desk I was met with the reply - "oh you're on the private jet!" - It brought a smile to my face.

This new prestige service from BA, using the Concorde flight numbers, is as close to a private jet experience that I have had and it certainly provides a unique way to travel across the Atlantic.

But what is this service really like?

My journey started two days earlier at London City Airport. The usual self service machines provided my boarding card and l had arrived with plenty of time before the gate closed for BA001. You can check-in as late as 20 minutes before departure with hold luggage (15 minutes with just hand luggage), although I wouldn't risk it with security to go through, twice, before you get to the departure gate.

After a short walk from the cosy BA lounge, out across the tarmac to the new Airbus A318, I was soon inside the new bright white cabin. Each pair of flat-bed seats are set in a large white pod giving this new cabin a clinical, futuristic look, especially from my seat on the back row at 8B. Although there are only 32 seats overhead locker space is limited. These storage areas do not hinge down, like on larger aircraft and although my bag was not as large as the maximum allowed as a carry-on it was a tight fit to secure it.

Walking to my seat I noticed that not only was this flight almost completely full but that there were children on board too.  Something I didn't expect for a service that has been promoted as linking two major financial centres.

As we taxied out, due to the lack of fixed in-flight entertainment screens, there was a 'live' safety demonstration complete with 'live' voice over. Why is it I always sit next to the passenger who thinks the safety information is either on their iPod or in the Financial Times?!

Take-off was swift and we were soon heading towards Shannon to top up the fuel tanks and get US immigration out of the way.

On the way to Ireland, once you are above 10,000ft, the mobile phone icon disappears (like the seat belt sign) which meant the new OnAir SMS/email/data system was operational. All I had to do was switch on my mobile phone and then I was able to send / receive texts and emails as if I was on the ground. Yes it was that simple.

Don't get too carried away with using the communications though as you do need to fill in all the immigration paperwork correctly, eat the light snack that is served and choose your drinks. All before you land at Shannon.

What wasn't available on this first leg of the journey was the in-flight entertainment. Inside the centre storage area, between the two seats, you will find only the stand that the media player is mounted on when it is handed out to you.

Distribution of screens does not happen until the Shannon JFK leg. The only explanation I had from the crew was that it was due to 'security reasons'. I can only imagine that as you have to take all your belongings off the aircraft in Ireland, any (very) expensive media players left on the seat might just be removed.

[Having spoken with BA since the flight they say that the system would need to be switched off on approach to Shannon before customers would be able to benefit from using it - not sure about this answer - see below.]

Once on the ground at Shannon it was a short walk to the security and immigration area. Again belts and shoes had to come off for the x-ray and then I wandered over to the immigration processing desks.  There were three very friendly US officers on duty and with such a small number of passengers waiting time was minimal. After the photo and fingerprinting I then walked out into a large corridor where there was a seating area specifically for BA JKF bound passengers.

After being on the ground for about 40 minutes we were back onboard and in the air heading for the USA. The cabin crew were soon serving drinks and taking orders for the lunch service. It wasn't too long before one of the crew began to hand out the in-flight entertainment screens.

The personal media player is operated by touch screen and can be mounted via the moveable stand (stored between the seats) or you can just hold it. It requires its own power supply so uses one of two plug sockets on each seat.

One socket is in the side of the centre armrest and the second socket is at the lower front of the seats again in the centre armrest.  The headphones then plug into the side of the screen. One thing to watch is that you do not get caught up in all the cables especially if laptops or other devices are plugged in around you.

A member of the cabin crew explained the in-flight entertainment service to each passenger and set up their media screen on the seat mounting bracket.  Although this was a very personnel service it did leave passengers at the rear of the aircraft waiting over an hour to receive their player.

[British Airways have agreed that the distribution of the players is taking a little longer than they anticipated. This, they say, is due to the fact that customers are not familiar with the system and that time taken to hand them out in the future will reduce dramatically once the crew and customers get more familiar with its use.]

Once fitted to the seat mount the screen lacks any tilting movement (fore and aft) this means that depending on your seating position and height you may not get the best picture.

The touch screen was very easy to use, the controls were easy to understand and the player offered a great range of current and classic movies. As these screens are not available on the (normal) BA fleet there specific pages in the in-flight magazine for the entertainment information for the LCY-NYC route.

Because all the movies, music and television programmes are stored on each individual player the in-flight entertainment is missing the 'moving map' facility. This may not be a big issue but with the 'live' systems used throughout the BA fleet, where screens are fitted to the business class seats, you can find out where you are and when you are due to land whenever you want. On this route you have to ask a crew member - who then has to speak to the flight deck. This point is now being monitored by BA and they are looking into ways of building something into the onboard communications between the cockpit and cabin crew.

I would guess that on this route a higher percentage of passengers will want to know when the aircraft is due to land, if it is on time, early or late. This is especially due to the fact that passengers can email or text from the aircraft to update their arrangements.
According to BA, due to the short runway at London City and the steep climb on takeoff, there are specific weight constraints on the Airbus A318. With the increased weight of hard wired IFE systems the lighter 'stand alone' handheld units, as used by Open Skies, were chosen.

Now you would be right in thinking that the flight crew do update passengers with the arrival details using the normal announcement system. Normally if you are on flights with the hard wired entertainment systems the programme usually pauses or mutes when these announcements occur. With these individual players this does not happen and as the supplied headphones are of such a good quality, cutting out the extra background noise from this type of aircraft, you can easily miss any updates/messages.

The use of mobile phones on aircraft in the USA is prohibited so when approaching New York the OnAir system is turned off. One thing that I missed, and it may have been due to the watching of a movie, was any announcement that this system was being deactivated. This again is only a small detail but could be an issue to passengers who may not be aware of the regulations.

Overall the flight was a great success and arrived 35 minutes early. From the lack of empty seats this route is already popular. Being a smaller aircraft, with the majority of the seats located alongside and behind the engines, there may be slightly more cabin noise than experienced in forward located Club World cabins.

By passing immigration in Shannon you depart the aircraft at JFK as a domestic arrival so if you only have hand luggage you can be leaving the airport in minutes.

Flying back on the Wednesday evening I had chosen the BA004 'sleeper service'. This allows you to maximise the amount of rest on the flight back by dining in the Terrace Lounge before you board the aircraft. Check-in from JFK closes 1 hour 45 minutes before departure.

On entering the terminal you see all the BA desks in front of you. Although there was still over two hours to departure the Club World desks were closed so I joined the World Traveller queue. Once I reached the desk I was advised that check-in desks for the London City route were around the corner. I saw no signage for this in the terminal. Once checked in I headed for the Terrace Lounge.

After the 'private jet' comment when I entered the lounge I was advised that when the Captain was ready to depart they would put out a call for passengers to make their way to the gate. On my boarding card it showed the time the gate closed, 22:50 for a 23:10 departure.

At 22:45, with no announcement made, I decided to make my way to the gate. All other flights had been called in plenty of time but for some reason BA004 was not. The departure gate wasn't the closest to the lounge and when I arrived to hand over my boarding card I was met with various comments on my punctuality and how the aircraft door was closing. They did however wait for the other passengers that were still in the lounge!

This time I was in seat 4K.

Soon after take-off the cabin crew served the 'night cap' food and drink service for those that wanted it. They also made a note of any breakfast orders for the morning, checking if passengers wanted to be woken for this service. You can also arrange to take a 'breakfast bag' off the aircraft and eat on the run.

The media players were also available on request.

An announcement was made soon after take-off about when the OnAir system would be available and that it would cease approximately 15 minutes before landing. British Airways have almost 300 cabin crew specially trained for this specific route. This was proved  as the crew provided a very high level of service, adding that little extra touch which although may seem small makes the passenger feel special.

Again we arrived early into London and the approach to City Airport is well worth a window seat.

British Airways certainly have something unique here with the 32 seats and the OnAir service. Yes you do have to go to Ireland but the service and lack of queues at immigration make the detour worthwhile. After speaking with them about the check-in at JFK BA are making sure passengers are updated on flight departures and it seems that my experience was a 'glitch' in the usual smooth running at this airport (the Yankees were playing which seems to bring most of NYC to a standstill).

It might just be me but I think the in-flight entertainment needs looking at. A quick fix would be to fix  the screens to the seat brackets, permanently, so the crew just had to hand out the power leads. Even if every passenger knows how to work the player a crew member can only really carry two screens and tow power leads at a time.

Although my comments may seem unimportant it is the small things that passengers remember and if they have travelled Business Class on BA, or another airline, they will compare the facilities and services. This route is promoted as a prestige service and it does all its facilities to live up to its passengers expectations.

I arrived in Dubai a few hours ago, after taking a thoroughly enjoyable flight on Emirates' 777-200LR out of JFK.

I've been writing about the carrier's stellar in-flight entertainment system ICE (information, communication, entertainment) for years, but this was the first time I've actually had a chance to  try it (in business class, praise the Lord).

I must admit I found the system a bit overwhelming at first. So many choices! But, on a 13-hour flight, having loads of choices is a very, very good thing.

The system, based on Panasonic hardware and CoKinetic software, further solidified my belief that embedded hardware IS NOT headed for the scrap heap, as some individuals have suggested. Indeed, having a robust IFE AND C offering (yes, Emirates offers sat phones and narrowband SMS/email) is crucial for long-haul flights.

I've taken my daughter's Barbie doll with me on this trip to stay in touch by sending snaps back to the munchkin. Here, Barbie does Bob Barker proud and showcases the funky, wireless multi-purpose seat control/system control in business class.



Emirates is making its "C" offering even better by equipping its fleet with AeroMobile's in-flight mobile connectivity solution. The Emirates birds now flying to the USA have not yet been equipped with AeroMobile, but that will come in due time.

AeroMobile chief commercial officer Peter Tuggey in August told me that, at that time, Emirates' AeroMobile traffic as a whole indicates that 35% of usage occurs on routes to Europe, 16% to the Middle East, 15% to North Asia, 4% to South Asia, 21% to Africa and 9% on Australasian route.

"When we look at where the traffic comes from, although we've got a lot of aircraft installed and Emirates moves aircraft around, the results that we have to date are representative of having 40% of the Emirates fleet installed. As we get on some more of their [Boeing] 777s, I think we'll see their traffic levels increase for the USA and Asia as well," he said.

So what's the #DXB09 in this blog post's headline, you ask. That's the hashtag that all aerospace journalists will be using when reporting from and about the Dubai air show on Twitter. I'm currently ensconced in the Flightglobal news room. Yeah, we got this baby wired and ready and rock n' roll. Come and join the party at Flightglobal's Dubai air show landing page.

Panasonic Avionics likes to do things BIG. That's why the in-flight entertainment and communications (IFEC) giant, which is bringing its eXConnect Ku-band connectivity solution to market, is offering business jet operators a special eXTraBandwidth package, which "provides a tiered offering of guaranteed, consistent bandwidth for high quality communications, such as dedicated voice, video conferencing and other bandwidth-critical applications".
 
I recently spoke to Panasonic vice-president, global communications services David Bruner  about the firm's eXTraBandwidth offering. No, I didn't ask him who came up with this peculiar combination of upper and lower case letters for eXTraBandwidth. Next time.
 
Here is Bruner in his own (gently paraphrased) words:

It's typical in the private aviation business for operators to buy certain programmes that give them a certain amount of minutes or megabits per second and if they use more, they pay a higher fee.

But what's different with eXTraBandwidth is, if for example you were to do a lot of voice calls or video conferencing and you need higher bandwidth and very consistent throughput and you can't afford to drop the connection, we can offer this service whereby you tell us how much bandwidth you want and we guarantee that amount of service to you while you're flying.

For that type of business jet market, where time is precious, owners/operators are willing to pay a significant amount of money for the best services. Yet they haven't ever been able to get really good communications services. It has never really matched up to the office experience.

Some folks are using older Inmarsat systems, and we're thinking they'd go to SwiftBroadband (SBB), but we can offer the same capital cost to the airplane and significantly less service costs, and corporate executives can now do anything they could do in their office as they could on the plane.

They can use their own cell phones on board the aircraft, or use phones on the aircraft. There are all different kinds of options. They can have installed a VoIP handset that's the airplane phone plus use their own phone. The eXTraBandwidth offering is for anything they want to do on the aircraft.

An operator could say - we want to lock in two or three megabits/second to our airplane every time we fly and we want that service guaranteed. That is really like having a DSL line to the airplane and that is something that has never before been offered to the marketplace.

Most people will still go for the regular plans because they find out the [basic eXConnect] service is excellent, but you'll have a few people - royalty and heads of state - that will really want this eXTraBandwidth when they fly.

Security is really important in this market. We have the ability to just present [governments] with a pipe and they can put whatever encryption they want on the airplane. This can really give them the comfort level they want to use the communication line for any kind of communication they want to and not worry about the privacy or that kind of stuff.

Side note -  Connexion by Boeing's service is understood to continue to fly on a variety of government aircraft, including Air Force One. I wonder if Obama would like some eXTraBandwidth.

Aircell has done a side-by-side comparison of its air-to-ground (ATG)-based in-flight Internet system (known commercially as Gogo) and the firm's connectivity solution based on Inmarsat's SwiftBroadband (SBB) service (which it sells to the bizjet market).

Check out the video below. Aircell highlights the vast difference in the speed of the two solutions. It should be stressed, however, that Aircell's ATG system is currently only offered in the USA, and by nature of its infrastructure cannot be offered on overseas flights, while the latter SBB offering is available globally.