Air Canada Airbus A330-300.
Satellite operators such as Intelsat will have to be prepared to make further technological investments as the flying public’s desire for, and expectation of, high levels of connectivity in the air reaches new heights.
While the quality of inflight entertainment and connectivity (IFEC) has improved substantially in the past few years as more and more satellite constellations are placed in orbit, passengers’ standards are moving relentlessly upwards, Intelsat Commercial Aviation director of product management Aaron Goldberg said at the Aircraft Interiors Expo (AIX) in Hamburg.
A decade ago, passengers were invariably expected to pay for in-flight internet sessions. That service is increasingly being given away for free. But airlines are still seeking ways to drive value from the service to offset the cost of putting IFEC systems on board. This is increasingly difficult when more and more passengers want “full, fast and free” onboard connectivity.
“It’s the challenge for the industry to figure out how to offset the cost of putting IFE on board,” Goldberg said. That could mean some passengers continuing to pay for the service, or sponsorship of some sort, or advertising and e-commerce solutions.
Air Canada will start providing free internet from May 1 but, at least initially, only to its loyalty program members. This may become a trend. It becomes a question of getting “the right product for the right passenger at the right time.”
Increasingly, there will be a diversity of business models. “In North America and elsewhere you’re starting to see airlines coalesce around free service to loyalty scheme members,” Goldberg said. But, for non-scheme members, “You’re also seeing a price point coalesce: you can get a full flight session for a single-digit sum. You’re going to see airlines explore how to use IFEC in a way that’s right for them.”
Airlines will also have to work out how to handle different types of onboard demand and this may increasingly require them to opt for multi-orbit solutions. “Multi-orbit, multi-network, multi-band,” Goldberg said.
For some types of usage, such as participating in work meetings, low-latency services from low Earth orbit (LEO) satellites will be required. For other types of connectivity, such as transmitting to the airline’s headquarters the terabytes of performance data produced by the aircraft, “whether the delay is 100 milliseconds, or 650 milliseconds doesn’t really matter,” because taken overall, companies such as Intelsat will need to make more investment “to keep up with people’s ever-increasing expectations,” Goldberg noted.
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