Thursday February 24, 2005

Pratt & Whitney is developing an all-digital wireless broadband inflight entertainment solution that will offer video-on-demand, live television and broadband Internet connectivity to airline passengers. The product also will enable what P&W Manager-Information Service Programs Colin Karsten called a ``next-generation`` health management system offering ``total`` aircraft and systems health monitoring and fault finding as well as improved troubleshooting. Aircraft and engine system sensors will be enabled to ``talk`` to the wireless onboard servers running Cloudlink and data will be communicated to the ground via broadband. He said it should be up and running in 18 months.

Is this cool or what? WiFi in-flight is the most exciting spot in commercial aviation. You heard it before on this site, WiFi is about to make IFE as we know it obsolete. Airlines can get rid of those dumb screens and poor content. They can also remove miles of wire and pathetic 386 processors that power most of the systems. All the IFE systems created aggravation for maintenance crews and created heat in-flight...its also good to see that Tenzing and Connexion are getting competition.