Lion Group carriers Batik Air and Malindo Air have picked Lumexis Corporation’s Fiber-To-The-Screen (FTTS) in-flight entertainment system for their incoming aircraft.
Each carrier now has a fleet of six Boeing 737-900ERs, all fitted with the Panasonic eX2 IFE system.
At a press conference in Singapore, Batik’s chief executive Achmad Luthfie says its 10 incoming aircraft this year – six Airbus A320s and four Boeing 737-800s, will all be fitted with Lumexis’ embedded IFE systems.
He adds that the new system will eliminate bulky seat boxes that intrude into passengers’ foot space. The system is also weight saving since it does without large and heavy copper data cables, reducing fuel burn and generating cost savings for the airline.
Lumexis chief executive Douglas Cline says the FTTS system has the lightest installed weight-per-seat of any embedded IFE system today, adding that it is generally about a third of the weight of competitors’ systems.
A Lion Group spokesman adds that Batik and Malindo will keep existing Panasonic systems in place, though it could replace them with the Lumexis system “later on”. Such a retrofit would probably be timed together with a heavy check, to minimise aircraft down time.
He adds that with the new system, Lion Group could also increase auxiliary revenue as passengers can access onboard services such as inflight catalogue shopping.
Batik is the full-service arm of Lion Group, based at Jakarta's Soekarno-Hatta International airport. Malindo is hybrid carrier based at Kuala Lumpur, a joint venture with Malaysia's National Aerospace Defence & Industries.
Source: Cirium Dashboard
