By Millie Turner
British satellite darling OneWeb has teamed up with in-flight entertainment giant Panasonic, in a partnership which could rival the looming Viasat-Inmarsat tie-up.
The deal will see Panasonic Avionics, which serves over 70 airlines, sell OneWeb’s in-flight broadband services to commercial airlines worldwide by the second half of next year, cementing aviation as the latest cash cow for satellite firms.
The service will even stretch to polar routes, the companies said in a statement today, allowing flyers to stream live videos and virtual conference via connection from OneWeb’s low-Earth orbit (LEO) satellites.
“Airline passenger expectations, and therefore the demands of our airline customers, continue to change,” vice president of Panasonic Avionics’ inf-flight connectivity business unit, John Wade, said.
“Passengers are accustomed to high-speed, low-latency connections supporting remote collaborative working environments, high-quality video streaming, and real-time gameplay. With OneWeb, we can now offer that experience everywhere our customers fly. This is a truly exciting day for the in-flight connectivity market.”
The partnership will also offer airlines more choices in the market, just weeks after the UK’s competition watchdog raised concerns that Viasat and Inmarsat’s $7.3bn (£6.4bn) merger could choke competition in terms of on-board wifi services.
Earlier this month, the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) said that with both companies having a strong presence in the aviation market, the billion-dollar tie-up would remove a significant element of competition.
Weaker competition could see airlines face higher prices and worse quality of on-board wifi as a result, the CMA said.
In a statement at the time, Inmarsat’s CEO Rajeev Suri, said: “Strong players are already offering in-flight connectivity and the new low-earth orbit (LEO) players – which already operate over half the satellite broadband capacity available globally – are aggressively and successfully targeting aviation. We expect competition to be robust in the years ahead.
“The highly complementary combination of Viasat and Inmarsat will support the UK government’s objective to drive growth by providing more jobs and investment in the UK space industry than we expect could be provided by Inmarsat as a standalone satellite communications provider.”
Viasat’s CEO and executive chairman Mark Dankberg added that the CMA’s decision to push for a second phase of its review was “not unexpected”, despite in-flight connection (IFC) representing less than 10 per cent of the satellite firm’s revenue.
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