With the support of Honeywell Aerospace,
The company will be the launch customer for Honeywell’s JetWave Ka-Band satellite connectivity system. The hardware will exclusively support Inmarsat’s Jet ConneX (JX) service, which will provide business jet passengers with high-speed, in-flight connectivity virtually anywhere in the world—a capability that will far exceed what’s currently possible on business jets. The service will go live in 2015.
Bombardier will offer the technology across the family of Global business jets. These include the 5000, 6000, 7000 and 8000 platforms. In addition, a retrofit offering will be available for all Global aircraft now in service. The antenna will fit inside an existing radome in the aircraft's tail. The Global 7000 will offer the system in 2016, the same year when deliveries to customers begin. A retrofit offering also will be available in 2016 for all Global jets currently in service. For the Global 8000, which is being developed in parallel with the 7000, the system will become available in 2017.
JetWave hardware will allow passengers to video-conference, send and receive large files, and access streaming video and other content while flying between destinations by enabling them to access Inmarsat’s JX service. A range of service packages will be available to Bombardier customers, enabling them to choose the speed that best suits their needs.
Each service package will be covered by a minimum service guarantee ensuring that passengers experience what Honeywell and Bombardier describe as a “remarkable step forward” in connectivity when compared to currently available technologies. “Our customers want to be online everywhere they go,” said Bombardier Business Aircraft President Eric Martel. “They will now experience the same level of connectivity in the air that they have come to expect on the ground without a drop in connectivity performance once they leave their homes or offices.”
Brian Sill, president of Honeywell Aerospace’s Business and General Aviation unit, referred to JetWave and Bombardier’s backing as “a major milestone in the evolution of business aircraft connectivity.” Sill’s characterization is no hyperbole. For users of business aircraft, connectivity and data performance have become at least as important than any other cabin feature. Commercial carriers are responding to similarly increasing demands from airline passengers.
In an earlier time, some level of connectivity was little more than a convenience. No longer. Now it is considered essential, and customers—especially users of business aviation—are being very vocal in expressing their desire for faster and consistently more reliable connectivity wherever they travel. When Wheels Up, one of the newest membership-based private aviation companies launched its service a year ago, principles behind the venture were astute enough to know that customized Beechcraft King Air 350i turboprop aircraft—an important part of the company’s fleet—had to have a Wi-Fi–equipped cabin.
During the next five years, broad band installations will increase by nearly 20%, according to John Broughton, director, Marketing and Product Management for Ka-Band GX Aviation at Honeywell Aerospace. In 2016, there will be some 10 billion smartphones worldwide for a global population of around 7.3 billion people. “We see [the JetWave system] as complementary to the growing interest in connectivity worldwide,” he said.
The fact that Global business jet operators will be able to have the same seamless connectivity in the air worldwide as they experience in their homes and offices is no trivial matter. This industry "first" is a differentiator, and will put Bombardier and its equipment supplier in a very advantageous position.
