February 26, 2007 – CALIFORNIAN IFE service and hardware provider IMS is set to reveal its thinking on the addition of off-aircraft connectivity to its range of handheld devices at the Aircraft Interiors show in Hamburg this April.

“We see air-to-ground companies like AirCell and others opening up some interesting opportunities for us by supporting the delivery of live entertainment and broadband connectivity to handheld devices,” says chief executive Joe Renton. “At Aircraft Interiors we’ll have some things to show the path we’re following.”

Renton, who last week took over as CEO following the departure of Alan Pellegrini to Thales Avionics, believes that connectivity in an IMS handheld could be a reality within 12 to 18 months. “We think we can readily integrate with off-aircraft connectivity systems via an 802.11g WiFi network in the cabin.”

The IMS handheld product range currently centres on the 7in-screen PAV-704 and 4.2in PAV-604, both based on commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) consumer electronics products from Archos of France (Inflight Online, February 12).

Although IMS’ original PEA handheld was custom-developed to a large degree, the company is now firmly wedded to the repurposing of COTS equipment. “When we made the original PEA we took mini-notebook technology and repurposed it,” recalls Renton. “But we ran into problems creating the exact look and feel that we wanted. Since then we have focused on consumer-available personal media players that lend themselves well to modification for IFE use.”

COTS also means fast and flexible, Renton says. “Introducing an embedded IFE product can be a two or three-year process – our timeline is much shorter, still not three months but definitely not three years. What the airlines have always wanted is the ability to ask for something and know that it’s going to be on their planes in six months or less. That’s now possible.”

The final big advantage of COTS is price: “Proprietary solutions are at a great disadvantage compared with those based on original products manufactured in consumer volumes. We’re benefiting from Archos’ investment in product development, and you can expect to see us doing some further interesting things with them in the next year or two – they are key partners for us.”

Renton is not ruling out future relationships with other mainstream electronics manufacturers, however. “As the market drives and the airlines develop their ideas, we’ll certainly look at the possibility of a device based on an ultra-mobile PC,” he says.

“UMPCs are progressing and we are closely monitoring the progress of certain candidates. Although we aren’t at present hearing airlines asking for Internet access on a 4in screen, our COTS strategy would allow us to migrate quickly and without significant R&D investment. We'll be ready to use UMPCs when the market needs their particular capabilities.”

Eyewear is another emerging technology that has caught the attention of IMS. “This is an interesting area that we’ll consider further once we see how it is accepted by consumers,” says Renton. “We had an eyewear unit in here recently and we used it with a video iPod. It certainly was cool to have that perception of a 42in screen sitting in front of you. But there are plenty of questions to be addressed, including how to drive many eyewear sets from a single video source, and how to do multiple distributions to a cabin full of them.”

Fewer questions surround IMS’ other hardware product line, represented by its Terminal Data Loader (TDL). This versatile device is permanently installed on the aircraft to receive new content loads both wirelessly (WiFi, GSM, CDMA) and through plugged-in physical media such as removable hard drives AIT tapes, DVDs, CDs and USB memory sticks. It is operational with American Airlines and British Airways and has been selected by Virgin America.

“We see the multiple ingest capabilities of TDL increasing as new technologies arise,” says Renton. One such could soon be WiMAX, the “WiFi on steroids” wide-area wireless protocol. “We’ve spent a lot of time looking at WiMAX and understanding what we can and can’t do with it. TDL could accommodate WiMAX, providing a wireless broadband last-mile content delivery mechanism. We could use our secure VPN to bring large, time-sensitive content sets to a location close to or even within the airport, then push them via WiMAX to TDL-equipped aircraft.”

One application for a WiMAX/TDL combination could be IMS’ existing Blast! news service, which it supplies to American Airlines. “Combining a WiMAX-enabled TDL with digital media reproducers would create a very basic head-end system capable of delivering Blast! editions to the aircraft without physical media and several times a day,” says Renton.

IMS also has a close interest in the application of wireless to deliver IFE to passengers aboard the aircraft. “Sending multiple streams from a wireless head-end to a number of wireless clients requires a lot of bandwidth, supported by a lot of weighty wireless access points, as well as creating security issues,” Renton comments. “Wireless loading of content to in-seat wireless clients when passengers are not on the aircraft potentially requires fewer WAPs and leads potentially to a simpler security solution. We see a lot of promise in storing the content on the client-side device instead of streaming from the head-end.”

With so much of its current business depending on the market among airlines for handheld players, IMS is thinking hard about the proliferation of personal entertainment devices among passengers. “While we recognise that more and more passengers are carrying their own PEDs, this does not necessarily mean that they are doing so with the intention of using them inflight,” Renton observes. “We think that passengers will continue to expect the airline to provide at least some devices to receive IFE for a very long time. As a result, onboard systems will have to be able to serve both airline-owned and passenger-owned user equipment, while the carriers will still have a need to supply content meeting the unique requirements of IFE.”

Renton also sees a human dimension driving a continuing demand for airline IFE provision. “PEDs force the user to think ahead at a time when he has a lot of other things to do, particularly if he is travelling with his family. Some people can do that, some just won’t. So I believe there will always be an opportunity to entertain a captive audience on an aircraft who on the spur of the moment will want access to a device or a portal for entertainment.”

“Always” is a very long time, but for the moment Renton is confident that IMS is in the right place with the right products. “We believe we’ve got some very strong prospects this year and into 2008 for our existing handheld offerings, plus possibly a slightly bigger device, and the TDL and its applications with both current and next-generation wireless technologies.”