In-flight Entertainment Research Articles

Passengers’ Perceptions of Chinese Airlines’ Service Quality: A Mixed Methods Analysis of User-generated Content

ABSTRACT This study examined passengers’ perceptions of the main Chinese airlines’ service quality based on user-generated content (i.e., quantitative ratings and narratives shared online), as well as investigating whether market segmentation can be based on traveler type. Text reviews and the associated ratings of service attributes, overall satisfaction, and intention to recommend were gathered from the Skytrax website for four top Chinese airlines. The research relied on mixed methods, namely, econometric modeling (i.e., multiple and logistic regression) and mixed context analysis. The most influential variable in terms of explaining overall satisfaction and intent to recommend is value for money. Different traveler types are homogeneous in their ratings of the most important attributes, but market segmentation can be based on other variables. The content analysis revealed seven main themes: recommendation, core service, seat comfort, food and beverages, ground service, value for money, and in-flight entertainment. The results contribute to the literature by clarifying service quality attributes’ impacts on intention to recommend and overall satisfaction among different traveler types. Analysis of specific user-generated content segments also provided a deeper understanding of the key concepts passengers use to describe their experiences and of differences according to airline reviewers’ origin (i.e., Western and Eastern).

All Right. Good Night. (Excerpt)

All Right. Good Night. (Excerpt)

Assessing the Impact of Technological Advancements on the Consumer Experience in Commercial Aviation

Technology has played a major role in changing the passenger experience in commercial aviation. Various laws and regulations in the aviation sector once prevented airlines from setting their own fares, but the eventual deregulation of this sector allowed airlines to create new business models and increase their profitability. This development led to greater competition between airlines and two main models developed: legacy and low-cost. A major trend since deregulation has been the decreased seat pitch in airplanes in order for airlines to maximize their profits. Utilizing classes such as first, business, and economy has allowed companies to negotiate seat pitch with a given price difference per option. The amenities that are available in the air have changed as a result of technological advancements as well. There has been a dramatic impact on inflight entertainment as a result of the better television technology and the development of touch screens. However, travelers believe that the quality of inflight meals has progressively declined. In addition, the impact of artificial intelligence has been massive for airlines, making certain processes more convenient for both the company and passengers. Although most individuals presume that airline companies receive a large profit per passenger, this is not the case since the cost for an average ticket in the commercial aviation industry has increased minimally compared to other industries. This paper analyzes the effects of such factors on the commercial aviation industry and whether the consumer experience has been positively or negatively impacted by them.

Investigating Which Services are Effective on Recommendation of the Airline Companies

This study aimed to determine which services provided by airlines had an influence on recommendations. The authors collected passenger scores from the years between 2014 to 2019 concerning the top 10 airline companies of 2019 from the website www.AirlineQuality.com, which is the site most commonly used by passengers to evaluate airline companies and airports worldwide. In total, we analyzed 5512 ratings. Binary logistic regression was applied to test the hypothesis. According to the results, the most influential criterion is value for money. The second most important criterion is customer relations. Seat and cabin space and meals and beverages follow customer relations. The least important criterion related to recommendations is in-flight entertainment. Previous studies were conducted using surveys. The present study used online ratings to determine airline attributes with the most and least influence on recommendations.

Customer adoption factors for in-flight entertainment and connectivity

The aviation industry has recently begun providing in-flight entertainment and connectivity (IFEC) services using information and communication technology (ICT). IFEC is a concept that adds connectivity to the existing in-flight entertainment (IFE) service, which allows passengers to access the Internet or use roaming, using their electronic devices. The purpose of this study is to identify the adoption factors that affect the customer's intention to use the IFEC. The customer's adoption factors are largely classified into utilitarian motivation and hedonic motivation, and the sub-factors are verified to be influenced by four independent variables: ease of use, voluntariness, enjoyability, and excitability. Hedonic motivation has had more impact, which is attributed to the customer's enjoyment and interest in the new service. Low cost carriers (LCC), who were unable to provide IFE services due to the lack of in-seat video systems (IVS), began offering airline-specific entertainment services through their personal electronic devices (PED). In the case of LCC, voluntariness had a meaningful effect on the adoption factor of IFEC, unlike full-service carriers (FSC), which provided IFE. This seems to have been influenced by the voluntary nature of passengers related to cost payment as a new service was introduced in LCC, which previously did not have IFE services. In-flight wireless fidelity (Wi-Fi) services are an important factor for airlines around the world who want to implement smart cabins, and the results of this study will help each airline find suitable IFEC services that consider customer adoption factors.

Investigating airline passenger satisfaction: Data mining method

In the current competitive environment, winning excellent services in the aviation industry can gain competitive advantages. Aviation companies should understand how their services satisfy customers' needs and want to achieve passenger satisfaction. This study examines airline passenger satisfaction using a data mining method. As for service attributes, we conclude that: (1) online/mobile boarding, (2) inflight wi-fi service, (3) baggage handling, and (4) inflight entertainment is the top 4 crucial service to be improved by the airline to gain passenger satisfaction.

Editorial for Wiley's IJSCN Special Issue “Satellite networks integration with 5G”

Editorial for Wiley's IJSCN Special Issue “Satellite networks integration with 5G”

Conceptual Multifunctional Design, Feasibility and Requirements for Structural Power in Aircraft Cabins

This paper presents a theoretical investigation into the potential use of structural power composites in regional aircraft passenger cabins and the corresponding challenges to widespread use, including fire resistance, long-term cycling performance, and cost. This study focuses on adapting sandwich floor panels with structural power composite face sheets, designed to power the in-flight entertainment system. Using a simple mechanical model to define the structural requirements, based on state-of-the-art laminated structural power composites, a series of electrochemical energy storage performance targets were calculated: a specific energy , a specific power , an in-plane elastic modulus , and in-plane tensile and compressive strengths . Significantly, the use of a distributed energy storage system offered a significant range of other mass and cost savings, associated with a simplified power system, and the use of ground-generated electrical energy. For an Airbus A220-100, the analysis predicted potential mass and volume savings of approximately 260 kg and 510 l and annual reductions in and emissions of approximately 280 tonnes and 1.2 tonnes respectively. This extended design analysis of a specific component highlights both the far-reaching implications of implementing structural power materials and the potential extensive systemic benefits.

Investigating a Streaming Analytics Framework for Data Analytics Applications in the Aircraft Cabin

<div class="section abstract"><div class="htmlview paragraph">Aircraft cabin operations shift towards data-driven processes. Cabin-wide multi-system communication networks are introduced to share required data for corresponding novel data-driven applications. Examples are data-driven predictive maintenance applications to reduce the downtime of systems and increase the period of scheduled maintenance or video analytics usage to detect a strained or unruly atmosphere amongst passengers. These applications require a network to transport the associated data and resources for actual computation. Costs and weight have always been the most important factors deciding if new services are introduced within the aircraft cabin. Thus, re-using hardware with free computation capacity that is already installed in the aircraft cabin can target both aspects, weight and costs. Examples for such hardware resources could be the In-flight Entertainment (IFE) equipment being installed in every seat. By means of distributed computing these resources can be combined in order to solve a computational task. In this paper, the Apache Spark Streaming Framework is investigated as an example for a distributed computing framework with respect to its suitability for being deployed in the aircraft cabin. For this purpose, it is evaluated how Spark scales with resource-constrained computing nodes. As this type of framework is designed for a robust execution of tasks, it can also be used for non-safety, but business-critical applications. In addition, Spark is a well-established commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) software, thus, possible advantages of such software like a reduction of non-recurrent engineering costs and support for developers creating applications for the aircraft cabin are also considered.</div></div>

Willingness to Watch the Pre-Flight Safety Briefing: A Structural Model

ABSTRACT Objective: The purpose of the current study was to examine the factors that significantly influence a passenger’s willingness to watch the pre-flight safety briefing. Background: The pre-flight safety briefing is a required presentation that must be administered to all passengers before conducting a flight. This briefing is most commonly delivered via a live demonstration by flight attendants or through the aircraft’s in-flight entertainment system, such as a seatback video. Method: Using a sample of 876 participants from the United States, we examined the influence of familiarity, anticipatory flight anxiety, conscientiousness, agreeableness, and frequency of flying on willingness to watch the pre-flight safety briefing. The study used a quantitative correlational design with structural equation modeling techniques for data analysis. Results: The results supported 5 of the 7 hypotheses. High levels of flight anxiety resulted in less willingness to watch the pre-flight safety briefing. Significant positive relationships were found between familiarity, conscientiousness, agreeableness on the willingness to watch. A strong relationship between willingness to watch and stated actual watching also was found. Conclusions: The study’s findings provide insight into what factors influence a passenger’s willingness to watch and examine the role personality factors have on willingness. As a result of this study, insights are gained into possible ways to increase passengers’ willingness to watch the pre-flight safety briefing and their consumption of this vital safety information.

Impact of digital technologies on airline operations

With more and more passengers choosing to fly by air, how to improve customer in-flight experience becomes an important issue for airlines. Digitalization has changed the way people enjoy their lives and it also has impacted on airline\’s business strategy. Thus, it is worth to investigate how digitalization impacts on passengers’ in-flight preference. Due to the different strategy, inflight entertainment (IFE) system has different application in low-cost airlines and full-service airlines. In order to balance the cost and revenue of airlines, a customer satisfied survey about IFE has been conducted to investigate how passengers value IFE when they travel by air. Since more than 1/3 of respondents thought IFE was an important element when they taking flights, it is meaningful to provide passengers with IFE systems to improve their satisfaction. Thus, based on passengers\’ needs, more types of movies and TV programs, personality functions, earphones, and other elements could be added to IFE systems to enhance customer in-flight experience.

Techno‐economic analysis of inflight connectivity using an integrated satellite‐5G network

SummaryThe demand for mobile broadband services is increasing exponentially alongside with user expectations regarding the reachability of these services and their prices. This paper presents an integrated satellite and fifth generation (5G) network for providing inflight connectivity and evaluates the economic viability of offering broadband connectivity to passengers on commercial airplanes by the development of a techno‐economic framework, which considers both capital and operational expenditures to compute the total cost of ownership (TCO) and an average cost per user and per Megabyte. Results show high operational costs mainly due to satellite bandwidth usage. Therefore, caching popular content on the network onboard is beneficial to reduce the traffic carried over the satellite link, thus lowering the operational costs as well. Furthermore, the framework is used to compare the identified business models for Inflight Entertainment and Connectivity offerings and their pricing strategies, alongside a benchmark against the current inflight connectivity pricing. Finally, a sensitivity analysis is elaborated in order to mitigate the uncertainty of inputs (e.g., rate of caching) used to feed the TCO model. Following concrete recommendations are the main result of this research: (1) Providing inflight broadband services with a 2–5 Mbps throughput per user is feasible if satellite communications is integrated into the 5G network. (2) Caching popular data reduces the operational costs and hence the average cost per user (from 25% to 32% depending on the caching rate adopted). (3) This framework allows to provide recommendations on the best suited business models and related pricing schemes.

Understanding the dynamics of the quality of airline service attributes: Satisfiers and dissatisfiers.

This research aims to determine the relationship between the quality of airline service attributes and overall satisfaction. Although a number of relevant studies have reported a linear relationship (or symmetric effect) between the two concepts, this work suggests that attribute quality exerts heterogeneous effects on satisfaction or dissatisfaction. A total of 157,035 consumer data from online reviews have been analyzed to achieve the research objective. In accordance with Herzberg, Mausner, and Snyderman’s (1959) two-factor theory, the findings of this research have determined that the quality of certain service attributes, such as cleanliness, food and beverages, and in-flight entertainment, affects the variations of positive ratings as a satisfier. Other airline service attributes, such as customer service and check-in and boarding, influence the deviations of negative ratings as a dissatisfier. Apart from airline attributes, the individual features and types of airline products have been estimated to improve the understanding of such relationships. In this regard, this study provides important implications to customer-centric marketing in an airline marketplace.

Methodical foundations of the preventing monitoring of aviation industry economic agents

The article formulates the methodical grounds for preventive monitoring of service and production components of economic agents of aviation industry. The structural-logical scheme for monitoring by quantitative parameters and by consumers’ feedback was proposed. The preventive monitoring is a valuable tool to recognize the interaction between government and industry’s goals considering sustainable development. The goal of the article is to develop methodological grounds for preventive testing of economic agents of the aviation industry, which will include assessment parameters, assessment scale, role instructions and transparency of results. The preventive tasting of airport operations is based on travelers’ experience on: queuing, airport shopping, terminal cleanliness, terminal seating, food beverages, Wi-Fi connectivity, terminal signs, airport staff, sentiment. The preventive testing for airline experience includes: value for money, cabin staff, seat comfort, food comfort, inflight entertainment, ground service, Wi-Fi connectivity, sentiment. The preventive testing for aircraft onboard experience assesses: legroom, seat recline, seat width, aisle space, viewing TV, power supply, seat storage, sentiment. The preventive testing for aircraft manufacturing and maintenance analyses: design, full-cycle manufacturing, warrantee, post-warrantee repair, consolidated designing, manufacturing and maintenance process, leasing, technological modernization, licensing. The article provides the comprehensive system for a preventive monitoring based on customer value, which fixes the key parameters for improvements of the operation of the economic agents of the industry. The conclusion of the research reasons the application of quality assessment based on consumer value created by industry’s agents for a preventive monitoring along financial evaluation and bankruptcy probability for the assessment of the sustainable development of the industry. The perspective of the further research may focus on formulating signaling system for government instruments and on detailing the rating scale for the industry’s agents, based on benchmarking practice.

Factor Determinants of Customer Satisfaction with Airline Services Using Big Data Approaches

In the commercial airline’s industry, customer satisfaction is critical. Due to increasingly fierce competition, customer satisfaction can affect airlines’ customer decisions in providing recommendations for prospective customers. For this reason, this study aims to explore the determinant factors that influence customer satisfaction and recommendations for the top 10 airlines listed on the Skytrax list. Using the big data approach, this study collected data from 10.189 customer reviews from 2012 to 2019. Based on the results of statistical analysis using binary logistic regression techniques, it was found that out of 7 factors, only 5 significantly influenced customer recommendations, namely airline rate, seat comfort, cabin staff service, food and beverages, and value for money. In-flight entertainment and ground services were not significant. The findings of this study contribute to strengthening the literature related to customer satisfaction in the airline sector, as well as managerial contributions to be used as a reference for airlines in improving service quality, particularly for long international flights.

Worst-Case Timing Analysis of AFDX Networks With Multiple TSN/BLS Shapers

This paper addresses the problem of worst-case timing analysis of extended Avionics Full Duplex Switched Ethernet (AFDX) networks, incorporating Time-Sensitive Networking (TSN) shapers called Burst Limiting Shapers (BLS), to enable the interconnection of different avionics domains with mixed-criticality levels, e.g., current AFDX traffic, Flight Control and In-Flight Entertainment. Conducting such an analysis is a challenging issue when considering multiple BLS-shaped traffic classes, due to the sophisticated inter-dependencies between the different shapers sharing the same output capacity. We tackle this problem through extending the applicability domain of our previous work for computing maximum delay bounds using Network Calculus and considering only one BLS class, called Continuous Credit-based Approach (CCbA), to handle multiple TSN/BLS classes. We provide further insights into the sensitivity and tightness issues of worst-case delay bounds yielded with the Generalized CCbA (GCCbA). Our assessments show that the tightness ratio is up to 85%, with reference to Achievable Worst-Case delays. We also show the improvements against recent state-of-the-art approaches in terms of tightness and complexity, where the computation time is up to 105 faster. Finally, we evaluate the efficiency of GCCbA for realistic avionics case studies, e.g., adding A350 flight control traffic to the AFDX. Results show the good applicability of GCCbA and confirm the efficiency of the extended AFDX, which decreases the delay bounds of the existing AFDX traffic by up to 49.9%, in comparison with the current AFDX standard.

Performance Evaluation of Wireless Protocols for Avionics Wireless Network

Ever-increasing demand for higher bandwidth and data rate for communication between line replaceable units in an aircraft is forcing aircraft manufacturers to turn toward alternative technologies, including wireless to replace the existing network of wires, for future generation aircraft. Wireless technology can meet most of the challenges of modern avionics systems, apart from significantly reducing the weight due to wires and associated hardware, with proper selection of technology. Boeing and Airbus have started using wireless technology for in-flight entertainment systems. Wireless Avionics Intra-Communication (WAIC) is expected to pave the way for use of wireless technology in avionics. One of the crucial factors in introducing a wireless network in an aircraft for flight critical operations is identifying a suitable wireless protocol that meets the avionics safety requirements. This paper aims to evaluate different commercial off-the-shelf wireless protocols for introducing an avionics wireless network (AWN) in an aircraft. The comparison is carried out on the basis of various parameters, such as transmission time, coding efficiency, throughput, range, number of nodes in AWN, energy consumption, and security. Based on the comparison and simulation, suitable protocols for WAIC have been identified.

Variations in airline passenger expectation of service quality across the globe

This study explores the interdependence between passenger travel experience and service quality in the airline industry for ten geographical regions across the globe. We extract 40,510 passenger reviews and rating information from Skytrax dataset between October 2011 and January 2018. To understand whether and to what extent passenger travel experience varies across geographical regions and their flight classes, we test sentiment score analysis of the reviews and path analysis methods. The results support the hypothesis that the geographical regions shaped by the country of residence of passengers impact travel experience, perception, and evaluation of airline services. North American passengers complain more about their national airline, while East and Southeast Asian passengers are more satisfied with Asian airlines. North American passengers care essentially about the money they pay for their flight and they pay less attention to in-flight services. East Asian passengers care more about in-flight services. Across all geographical regions, seat comfort is the most important factor to evaluate the value for money of the flight. Cabin staff service, however, is the main feature to rate overall flight experience. The results also corroborate that the expectation of passengers is different between the first or business classes and the economy class. Passengers in first or business class are more concerned about seat comfort, food and beverages, and in-flight entertainment. Passengers in economy class are more concerned about the value for money.

SDN@Play: Software-Defined Multicasting in Enterprise WLANs

Concurrent distribution of multimedia streams toa high number of end users through a wireless network is extremely popular nowadays. Nevertheless, multicast traffic orchestration over traditional WiFi networks is still an important problem for network operators. Low multicast data rates and poor coexistence with other services are just some of the challenges that must be faced when deploying multicast solutions over WiFi. In this article we present SDN@Play, a centralized approach to manage multicast flows based on software-defined networking (SDN) principles. We also report on a proof-of-concept implementation of SDN@Play that can be used in several scenarios ranging from vehicular networks to in-flight entertainment systems, and from enterprise group to machine type communications applications. Finally, we make the prototype fully available to researchers and practitioners under a permissive APACHE license.

In-Flight Casinos, Is It Really a Nonsensical Idea? An Exploratory Approach Using Different Choice Experiments

Most airlines make various efforts to enhance their customers’ levels of in-flight satisfaction while offering alternative services and entertainment. As an innovative service item, some international airlines plan in-flight casino facilities to relieve their customers’ boredom and fatigue emanating from tedious long flights. Using a study sample of casino visitors in Korea, we intend to better understand how potential airline passengers show their willingness to pay for the hypothetical in-flight casino services. We also employ multiple choice experimental techniques to examine preference heterogeneity embedded in the sampled population. Based on study results, several management strategies are discussed for offering tailored in-flight entertainment services to targeted market segments.