Skyted has added Bluetooth to its Seat2Seat ‘silent call’ headset, this enabling cordless calls, rather than having a cable connecting the headset and the mobile phone.
“It’s working now and ready to go to the market,” said Skyted chief executive, Stephane Hersen. “Cable can still be used if someone wants to, but the Bluetooth is working perfectly. The first shipment will be going out on 8 June.
“There is a big demand from airlines, and we’ve got lots of people who want to get it in their car, in the train, in their Uber, and in their offices. We’re talking to airlines who are masterminding their plans of how to go ahead. For example, should they include it in the IFE? Or should we be going directly to the market?
The average background cabin noise is around 75dB, but speech above 50dB but below that ambient noise level is picked up by the Skyted microphone but not by those around the caller. And as well as making phone calls to the ground, the system enables seat-to-seat chat so that business conversations or even a group chat is possible.
“When you’re in business class today there is no place to hang out with two, three or four people to have a meeting, open laptops and discuss freely. Now I can stay in my seat, have my Excel spreadsheet, and we can have a private office inside the business class cabin,” Hersen says.
Although the company wants airlines be on board, it also has a B2C campaign under way, aiming to get the headset straight to the consumer. “We want to work with duty free shops to get the product in front of passengers before they board,” Hersen says.
