American Airlines continues in-flight Wi-Fi revolution

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American Airlines continues in-flight Wi-Fi revolution

By MATT LEWIS

Published: 21 August, 2009

READ MORE: Wi-Fi

When Boeing's Connexion in-flight Internet access service went kaput in 2006 many felt that it was the death knell for Wi-Fi on planes. But something of a revolution has taken place in the US over the past year. Yesterday, American Airlines announced an expansion to its in-flight Wi-Fi to more aircrafts. The service, branded "GoGo", is now available on 100 of American's MD-80 aircraft, with another 50 installations planned by the end of the year. The announcement coincides with GoGo's launch anniversary - a year ago, AA was the first US airline to launch the GoGo service. Soon after, Delta Air Lines followed, along with Air Tran.

The service, which is powered by technology provider Aircell, is now onboard a total of 505 aircrafts and American plans to expand Internet access to about half its fleet over the next two years. This will place it behind Virgin America which in March became the first airline to offer fleet wide in-flight internet access.

In total, some 66% of all flights between New York and San Francisco and Los Angeles have in-flight broadband and market research firm In-Stat is predicting that 800 planes will offer broadband by the end of 2009 versus just 25 in 2008, generating $47 million in global revenue. By 2012, In-Stat expects in-flight broadband will be a billion dollar business.

As with so many things in wireless, GoGo's success appears to be down to its positive user experience. A review for the service posted at the blog Eric's Corner commends the simplicity of signing-up for the service either on the ground or during the flight. More importantly, the broadband performance is well above 1Mbps and although latency fluctuated, it was generally low. The reviewer commented: "I had no issues with YouTube streaming and web pages loaded as fast as I were on my cable modem at home with Rogers highspeed Internet." A screen shot of Eric's speed test is shown below.

GoGo speed test
Source: Eric's Corner

GoGo pricing ranges from $5.95 to $12.95 based on length of flight and whether the device is a handheld PDA or a laptop computer.

Unlike Connexion which used satellite backhaul and required an expensive phased array antenna housed within the aircraft fuselage, Aircell is using regular EVDO Rev. A over a chunk of 800MHz spectrum which it owns nationwide. Around 100 base stations dotted around the country generate sufficient coverage to supply most airline routes with access. It's a much simpler solution to implement in within a plane.

Airlines continue to get hammered by the current economic downturn and fat is being trimmed left, right and centre to aggressively cut costs - British Airways' free sandwiches a most recent victim. An airline's decision to actually invest in new technology infrastructure shows confidence in traveler demand for access.