Honeywell to supply airborne hardware for Inmarsat's Global Xpress

This exclusive agreement is estimated to represent $2.8 billion for Honeywell in sales of hardware, customer service and maintenance to airlines, government entities and OEMs over the next two decades.
 

Inmarsat's Global Xpress is scheduled for launch in 2013, with a global service for commercial, business aviation and government customers available in 2014.

 

By 2016, it is estimated there will be 10 billion mobile devices in the world, and a global population of approximately 7.3 billion people. Demand for data traffic is expected to grow by a factor of 50 for smart phones and a factor of 62 for tablets.

 

With Global Xpress, Honeywell says it will be in a leading position to deliver airborne connectivity solutions to this rapidly-expanding market.

 

Tim Mahoney, President, Honeywell Aerospace, said: “With this new service, the flow of information will no longer stop when the door to the aircraft closes.

 

“Honeywell identified global aircraft connectivity as a future growth trend, and through the combination of the recently-acquired EMS Technologies' expertise and Honeywell’s global aerospace franchise, the company is the perfect partner to launch the Inmarsat Global Xpress aerospace network.

 

“We believe this new network will significantly expand the connectivity options of consumer, business and government customers around the world.”

 

Global Xpress will operate in the Ka-band, with four times the bandwidth available compared with alternative solutions in the lower frequency Ku-band.

 

Honeywell says this expanded spectrum, delivered via spot beam technology, will enable Global Xpress to outperform Ku-band based services in both speed and cost.

 

It says travellers will be able to use their iPads, smartphones, tablet devices and laptops to do everything from real-time social media, to video conferencing and multi-media presentation development while in flight, virtually anywhere in the world, and with an experience similar to being at home or in the office.

 

Honeywell already supports Inmarsat’s current SwiftBroadband L-band service.

 

“Passengers worldwide are hungry for better connectivity and more expanded services during flights, driven in part by the explosion of tablet devices,” said Carl Esposito, Honeywell's Vice President, Marketing and Product Management.

 

“Airlines are taking notice of this development and placing a higher value on passenger connectivity as a way to add value and differentiate their services.”

 

Global Xpress will also allow government users to communicate mission-critical information with ground bases regarding details about position and status of manned and unmanned aircraft.

 

Additionally, Honeywell believes that the network connectivity requirements of government users to “always be on” will drive an accelerated level of adoption of this service.

 

Global Xpress's main competitor is currently the Ku-band services from Panasonic Avionics. Panasonic has been working hard to lease more Ku-band coverage and is set to announce a further deal with a major satellite provider, rumoured to be Intelsat, in the near future.

 

Panasonic also recently bought a majority stake in inflight connectivity provider Aeromobile from Norway's Telenor.