Boeing Reveals Plan for In-Flight Internet Service
Setting its sights on capturing the nascent market for in-flight Internet access, Boeing Co. unveiled a service Thursday that will use a satellite-based communications network to provide passengers with high-speed online connections, television and other entertainment.
Rockwell International Corp. said separately that it will buy Sony Corp.’s Trans Com unit in Irvine to increase its airborne communications and entertainment offerings. Rockwell is a leader in in-flight entertainment on wide-body aircraft; Sony is a leader in creating the same types of systems for narrow-body planes.
The services aim to allow air travelers to watch the football game of their choice, order groceries over the Internet for their return home, check e-mail and send messages to those picking them up--all from 32,000 feet in the air and hundreds of miles away.
“People expect to have access to information. What we haven’t been able to offer them is live-broadcast TV, access to real-time news, live sporting events,” said Clay Jones, president of Rockwell Collins Inc., the Rockwell subsidiary that will operate Trans Com.
Boeing’s service, called Connexion by Boeing, will cost about the same as a cellular telephone call and will include information provided by such partners as CNN, CNBC and Loral Skynet, Boeing said.
Connexion, which will be spearheaded by Boeing’s Anaheim information services division, will allow passengers to use laptops to surf the Net at speeds that rival digital subscriber lines or cable modem lines--up to 140 times faster than the fastest standard modem service.
Boeing’s system has been used since 1997 in private business jets and military airplanes and cost $100 million to develop. It is an outgrowth of its efforts to transform military technology into commercial uses.
“We think we’ve matured the product in the last two to three years of testing to take it to the primary market,” said Rick Vandermeulen, the division’s director of strategy and planning.
The system will use existing satellites at first, providing broadband access to passengers over North America beginning late next year.
Boeing officials declined to say how much it would cost to bring the technology aboard existing aircraft or to build it into new planes.
The heart of the Boeing system is a panel just 2 inches thick, measuring 44 inches by 55 inches, that sits atop the fuselage. Cables in the cabin floor will bring data directly to passengers, who could plug in their laptop computers or access programming through built-in monitors at every seat.
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Times staff writer E. Scott Reckard contributed to this report.
