Lufthansa and Austrian Airlines are starting a new phase of development and modernization by providing in-air Wi-Fi system in short haul and mid-range flights. Now passengers of Lufthansa and Austrian Airlines can send emails from a height of 10,000 meters, shop online, stream videos.
Harry Hohmeister, member of the Board of Directors of Deutsche Lufthansa AG and responsible for Hub Management, says “I am pleased that we can soon offer broadband Internet to our passengers on inner-European flights, giving them the chance to have a seamless digital experience. Since the launch of Lufthansa Flynet, it has been our goal to offer added value on board to our customers through innovation – and that also includes our Internet provision”.
Lufthansa received the Supplemental Type Certificate from the European Aviation Safety Agency last summer and successfully completed all the required preparation work. The next stage of testing on Lufthansa and Austrian routes will involve five aircraft. Passengers who fly on these aircraft will be offered free Internet use during this test phase. The analysis of the user behavior will be used to further improve the service before launching.
In the first quarter of 2017, the number of Lufthansa aircraft with Internet access will rise to around 20. The re-fitting of all 31 aircraft at Austrian Airlines is planned to be completed before the end of April 2017. As well as Lufthansa and Austrian Airlines, Eurowings also has plans to bring the Internet on board its aircraft A total of 69 Eurowings aircraft are to be fitted with the systems by the summer of 2017.
The Internet service of Lufthansa Airlines and their technology partner Inmarsat uses the latest broadband satellite technology (Ka-band) and provides better coverage on short haul and mid-range flights via the Inmarsat network Global Xpress Inmarsat partner Deutsche Telekom will be the ISP for Lufthansa.
Lufthansa Systems is providing the necessary technical infrastructure for Internet connection on board like network operations in the aircraft, the technical requirement for Wifi as well as the provision of the essential software through which customer gains access to the net.
