Renesys Todd thinks Panasonic is buying the thing.
a.harrowell@gmail.com writes:
Renesys Todd thinks Panasonic is buying the thing.
As I understand it, Panasonic's product is different, cheaper, and not
a turnkey service (they don't have their own satellite transponder
constellation). It is aimed at nation-states, not the commercial
market.
---rob
Not according to this news story. (Full text below)
They are contracting to airlines and will proceed if they can get 500 planes guaranteed by the end of the year.
f
INFLIGHT ONLINE EXCLUSIVE: Panasonic reaches for the Connexion torch
September 19, 2006 - JUST when the Inmarsat community was relishing the prospect of an unobstructed run at the passenger broadband market, Panasonic has announced a plan to take up where Connexion by Boeing left off. The IFE giant has no intention of rushing in, though, and will not launch unless it has commitments covering a critical mass of aircraft.
"We have a complete system designed, developed and ready to go," strategic marketing director David Bruner told Inflight Online at the WAEA show in Miami Beach last week. "But we're determined to avoid one of the things that brought Connexion down - lack of an initial fleet big enough to assure acceptable pricing for the airlines."
Panasonic has set about securing agreements covering a minimum of 500 aircraft in the next 60 days. That schedule is being driven by the need to be ready to serve ex-Connexion airlines within a tolerable time after the discontinuation of that service by the end of the year. "We can't drag our launch decision on until, say, February," Bruner said. "There will inevitably be a dark period between the end of Connexion and the start of our service, and we want to keep that as short as possible. We already have 150 aircraft committed and feel confident we'll make the 500. But if we're falling badly short in 60 days' time we will not go."
Early takers would enjoy significant advantages over airlines that were slower of the mark, Bruner said. "In return for a minimum five-year commitment we'll reward our launch customers with very preferential service pricing, and they will also get priority access to bandwidth."
Panasonic's standard wholesale price to the airlines would represent a comparatively small premium on terrestrial broadband access tariffs, Bruner said. "So far we are seeing little indication that the airlines are planning to mark this up for passengers. It's a service they want to offer - they don't currently see it as a revenue-generator."
The new offering is designed to be as attractive as possible to airlines that are already equipped for Connexion. "Our solution for them is to replace only the modem on the aircraft and leave all the rest of the hardware, including the antenna, in place," said Bruner. "That will spare them the expense of reversing the Connexion installations and then putting in our definitive equipment suite."
That includes a compact Ku-band antenna from Californian-based L-3 Datron Advanced Technologies. Another L-3 Communications operation, the Linkabit division, is supplying the modem. Both are already fully developed for US military applications and have been modified for civil use by removing the encryption provision. Working with an existing Ku-band satellite system, the hardware is capable of delivering 12Mbit/sec to the aircraft and 3Mbit/sec in the opposite direction, according to Bruner.
Panasonic has selected a single Ku-band satellite operator to provide transponder capacity and geographical coverage at least equivalent to Connexion's. "With an initial fleet of 500 aircraft we would anyway pay significantly less for transponders than Connexion," Bruner pointed out. "But our technical solution will also be more efficient than theirs, allowing us to put more traffic through each transponder and thus reduce our total requirement for satellite capacity."
Panasonic saw itself as a system designer and integrator and had no intention of incurring the costs associated with being a service provider, Bruner said. The as yet unidentified satellite operator would be responsible for system management, operation and capacity planning, and Panasonic is in talks with a global wireless roaming company for the provision of services such as customer care, billing and retail promotion.
"We're intent on learning from what happened to Connexion," said Bruner. "9/11 lost them their start-up fleet, and after that they were always struggling to catch up. Our onboard equipment is lighter and cheaper, and our approach to buying transponder capacity is altogether more economical. We think these advantages will persuade the airlines and that in a couple of months' time we'll be ready to go ahead."
Should the magic 500 not be achieved, however, Panasonic will continue to look for another way into connectivity. "If Ku-band proves not to make sense after all, then we'll go down another path," Bruner concluded.
At least one other passenger communications provider will be watching developments carefully. AeroMobile is currently to committed to L-band operator Inmarsat as the bearer system for its soon to be introduced onboard cellphone offering. But it is also looking to offer email and Internet/VPN access in the longer term, and would be open to integration with the Panasonic Ku-band system in the same way its new GSM/GPRS cellular offering is being integrated with the company's onboard IFE infrastructure.
"We're completely agnostic when it comes to air-to-ground data pipes," commented AeroMobile strategic relationships and marketing director David Coiley. "In the end we could find ourselves working with Inmarsat, Panasonic and even the AirCell terrestrial broadband system in North America."
Fascinating... of course, you can see where the confusion came from,
particularly given the source of some of the components and the fact
that they're not actually committed until they get the orders (hence,
no satellite capacity online _today_). Thanks for the additional
data; I'm sure everyone here will be watching this one closely; the
"email/web/irc/AIM from the skies" imperative runs quite high in our
community 
---rob
Fearghas McKay <fm-lists@st-kilda.org> writes:
Robert E.Seastrom wrote:
Fascinating... of course, you can see where the confusion came from,
particularly given the source of some of the components and the fact
that they're not actually committed until they get the orders (hence,
no satellite capacity online _today_). Thanks for the additional
data; I'm sure everyone here will be watching this one closely; the
"email/web/irc/AIM from the skies" imperative runs quite high in our
community
Early on I was also able to use Skype (with video) successfully but lately the capacity has just not been there. Not sure if they've reduced it towards the end or if the usage has picked up enough for there not to be spare capacity for ~200kbps video.
Pete
As a result of this thread, I went digging for people to talk to, and have learned quite a bit:
It costs around $500k to equip a plane.
Every piece has to be type certified for each plane (ethernet wire and connectors, circuit boards to not be toxic when they catch fire, etc).
The bulk of the cost is for labor in installation of the antenna as well as the electronics
There is (was) a budding business in providing a maritime solution to compete with INMARSAT - commercial shipping companies were beginning to install the solution that costed $70k (vs. $500k) because it did not need the aircraft certification and inspections and effort.
Each transponder (covering specific regions - obviously) was leased for about $1M a year - they don't belong to Boeing. This was a major ongoing cost.
Boeing had worked on a much cheaper solution using cellular technology for over-land solutions and an underbelly antenna that the domestic US airlines were hoping for.
A General Aviation Electronics provider was integrating the satellite system into small jets that utilized a much cheaper tail-based antenna that was working.
On certain routes, (Hitech city to Hitech city like Hong Kong to Seattle, London to Los Angeles, etc) the usage reached the point where it was already profitable.
Boeing's marketing folks on this were ill-equipped to sell a "consumer" service like this. No clue.
Boeing covered the cost of the install, not the airline. And Boeing handled the billing process (the infrastructure that has now been "ripped out" hence the free service till they drop the airline service. And Boeing paid a small piece of revenue to the airline.
The airlines had very little incentive therefor to push the service, and so they haven't (wouldn't it have been useful if the airline reservation clerk finished each call for an equipped flight reservation by offering the service on the upcoming flight?).
The airlines refused to allow Boeing access to their customers to push the service.
Boeing should have cut a deal that allowed the airlines to handle the billing - so that the airlines had control of the customer, and therefor had an incentive.
<sigh>. There were some suitors, and Boeing turned them down.
Its a pity that this couldn't have been tossed over to the geek world when Boeing knew it was in trouble. There are a lot of folks on this list with satellite on a shoestring type clue (ex-Cidera, third-world comms, etc).
OK, I'm done, unless someone has an idea and wants to try put a group together to solve this. In which case an alternative list would be the right place to begin the discussion. ;-).
rodney, all,
nice commentary, rodney. useful.
one additional fact is relevant here: at it's peak, boeing connexion
employed over 670 people (mike hughes pointed me to the nubmer and i
can't find the link).
astonishing staffing for a service of this size.
i've commented on the panasonic infrastructure seeking a service
operator over at :
http://www.renesys.com/blog/2006/09/panasonic_to_bring_back_connex.shtml
t.
Todd Underwood wrote:
nice commentary, rodney. useful.
one additional fact is relevant here: at it's peak, boeing connexion
employed over 670 people (mike hughes pointed me to the nubmer and i
can't find the link).
It is an astonishing number, was over 750 at it's peak.
http://www.boeing.com/employment/employment_table.html
I'm curious as to how many folk carried out different kinds of jobs. I imagine a huge proportion deal/dealt with installations which is going to be a labour intensive process on aircraft.
People wondering about at-seat power (including the AC 'myth') can check here http://www.seatguru.com/ - no idea how accurate it is.
Will