Inmarsat's European short-haul wifi spacecraft launches

A new Europe-wide wifi service for aeroplanes came a step closer on Wednesday night with the launch of a key satellite from French Guiana.

Airline passengers will soon be able to connect to the internet either through this spacecraft or a complementary system of cell towers on the ground.

The company behind the so-called European Aviation Network is Inmarsat, the UK’s biggest satellite operator.

It is building the system in tandem with Deutsche Telekom of Germany.

The pair hope to start services at the back end of the year, with Lufthansa and the AIG Group (Aer Lingus, British Airways, Iberia and Vueling) being the first airlines to equip their planes with the necessary equipment.

This would include an antenna on the top of aircraft to connect upwards to space, and another terminal in the belly of the plane to link down to what initially will be 300 4G-LTE towers concentrated along Europe’s main short-haul routes.

Passengers in the cabin wanting to surf the web or watch a video would simply join a hotspot as they would if they were in a cafe or a hotel.

• Satellite giant to boost wi-fi on planes
• Inmarsat rides SpaceX Falcon into orbit
• Lufthansa to offer short-haul broadband

• The European Aviation Network (EAN) has been a while coming. The European Commission first awarded two licences for satellite communications operating in the S-band part of the radio spectrum back in 2009; and expected services to be up and running by December of last year.

  But both Inmarsat and the other licence holder made slow progress in developing a business case that would make best use of the frequency.

  Image copyrightESA/CNES/ARIANESPACE

  Image captionThe spacecraft also carried a payload for the Hellas-Sat operator which will transmit TV channels to Europe, the Middle East and Africa

  In the beginning, many commentators thought that case might involve mobile phones which could connect either to a satellite or a local cell network. However, this was before in-flight connectivity (IFC) became a boom market.

  Wifi on planes has traditionally had a wretched reputation, but the technologies are changing and the user experience is fast improving.

  “We conjured lots of business cases and then during that journey along came IFC and it’s a perfect fit,” said Rupert Pearce, the CEO of Inmarsat.

  “The short-haul market is growing twice as fast as in North America in terms of planes and passenger journeys, and it’s set to become the largest short-haul aviation market in the world. Only briefly because I think China will over take it. China are going to build 50 airports in the next five years, so it’s very hard to compete with them; but absent that, the European opportunity is very exciting.”

  Already, the aero market is one of Inmarsat’s fastest growing sectors, and it has big Ka-band satellites, dubbed Global Xpress, feeding connections to long-haul flights. The EAN is targeted specifically at the single-aisled planes making quick hops around Europe.

  Deutsche Telekom has still to switch on the ground segment and debug it, says Mr Pearce; and the new satellite, launched on an Ariane rocket from Kourou on Wednesday, will take three to four months to commission. Lufthansa and AIG, who the CEO describes as strategic partners, can then start a period of testing, he adds.

  But there is some serious push back from the competition.

  Other satellite operators are critical of the Inmarsat offering, believing it to be an infringement of the original terms of the S-band licence awarded by the EC.—–http://www.bbc.com