• Aircraft to meet expansion plans at low cost carrier

Farnborough, UK | July 11, 2016– Vietnam’s Jetstar Pacific Airlines has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with Airbus for 10 A320ceo aircraft. The agreement was announced today during the Farnborough Air Show and will mark the first direct purchase of aircraft by the airline with Airbus.

Based in Ho Chi Minh City, Jetstar Pacific is a joint venture between Vietnam Airlines (70%) and the Qantas Group (30%). The airline currently operates a fleet of 12 leased A320 Family aircraft, flying to 28 domestic and regional destinations.

“This agreement marks a milestone in our development,” said Le Hong Ha, Chief Executive Officer of Jetstar Pacific. “The new aircraft will allow us to expand our operation on our international network from Vietnam as part of the wider Jetstar Group. With low operating costs and a comfortable cabin, the A320 enables us to offer our passengers a quality value-based product in a highly competitive market environment.”

“We are pleased to have signed our first MOU with Jetstar Pacific,” said John Leahy, Airbus Chief Operating Officer Customers. “The news reinforces the position of the A320 as the single aisle aircraft of choice in both the low cost and full service sectors. We will look forward to working with Jetstar Pacific as it consolidates its position in the fast-growing Vietnamese market.”

The A320 Family is the world’s best-selling single aisle product line with nearly 12,600 orders since launch and more than 7,100 aircraft delivered to some 320 operators worldwide. With the widest cabin in the single aisle market, the A320 Family offer unmatched comfort in all classes and Airbus’ 18” wide seats in economy as standard. The A320 Family aircraft seat from 100 to 240 passengers, seamlessly covering the entire single-aisle segment from low to high-density domestic to longer range routes.

Sometimes we love our work… and this is one of those stories. Covering companies like Lumexis is one for the story books because they are the “IFE Mouse that Roared.” For at least 5 years now, we have been writing about Rich Salter Jr. and Doug Cline and their dream to develop a lighter weight, higher bandwidth IFE system based on fiber optic connectivity and we could not be happier for them. IFExpress covered their escapades from development boxes to show floor rumors and at this year’s AIX in Hamburg, it looks like they won all the marbles: first customer and Crystal Cabin Award. Ah, life is good.

Their first customer, flydubai, is a low cost Arab Emirates airline offering low cost fares to-and-from Dubai with only one-way tickets that are tax inclusive. All extra services are separate and passengers know exactly what they get for their money… nice touch! Pictured in the story is the CEO of flydubai and Doug Cline, President Lumexis. We talked with Mr. Ghaith Al Ghaith, airline CEO and he told us that their 44 B737-800’s will be post delivery modified in the US and that each seat will have a Lumexis display that acts as an entertainment portal with credit card swipe capability. Obviously, their revenue generation model is part of the airline operating network and plays into the airline financial modeling. With routes as long as 4.5 hours, the airline has a perfect product to interface with their customers. Snacks, food, duty free all will be ordered through the Lumexis system, easing crew work load and further automating the aircraft as part of the airline network. Think of it as an onboard accountant. The airline CEO told us that they chose Lumexis because the system was simple and powerful, yet light-weight. We were surprised to find out that the system weight boiled down to 4.4 pounds per seat and is a very impressive number that we heard from the airline and Lumexis alike. Installation ease and maintenance were also mentioned as features, probably because the airline sees value in quick turn-arounds and overnight maintenance. First delivery is in October of 2010 – Stay Tuned.

Also, we note that the Aircraft Interiors Crystal Cabin IFEC Award went to Lumexis and their fiber optic entertainment system and they are quite proud, as you can imagine. The award is for innovative aircraft cabin products, and the prize in the Entertainment and Communication category was won by Lumexis Corporation for its Fiber-To-The-Screen™ system, as the first fully fiber-optics based In-Flight Entertainment (IFE) system. It was cited that the system eliminates the seat electronics box and half the other boxes required by legacy systems, and thereby reduces the weight and cost of ownership. Huge bandwidth is provided by the fiber network to each seat, so that future functionality can be added over the life of the aircraft.

iPad Hoopla Update: Re last week’s IFExpress article – Here is what we have discovered to further round out the Jetstar/iPad story – Jetstar is purchasing the iPads directly from Apple. Their Content Services Provider, Stellar Inflight, commissioned Bluebox to repurpose the devices for IFE. The rental price is purported to be A$10, US$8.40.