FUTUR E V I SION
different places on the weight-comfort spectrum,
premium economy seats that basically all look the
same, and business class seats that are, for the most
part, staggered or herringbone products, with or
without a door.
Innovating within this envelope is increasingly
difficult. The first-mover airlines that want to lead with
onboard product desire uniqueness and exclusivity in
return for their launch customer status. Sometimes that’s
achievable in terms of materials and shapes, sometimes
it’s achievable in terms of the entire product.
That leaves the second-movers in a sticky situation.
It’s hard to get passengers excited about a new iteration
of a product that has been flying elsewhere for some
time, especially if some of the changes to that product
are less than improvements themselves.
ENGAGE MORE CLOSELY WITH
AIRFRAMERS
As the A380 begins to be phased out, the future for widebodies
is the A330, A350, B787 and B777 – unless Boeing
brings back a passenger version of the B767 out of left
field. For many interiors players, the fact that we are
unlikely to see an all-new widebody airliner in service
before the very end of this decade – the CRAIC C929 –
means that the focus will need to be on creating new
opportunities within a known and, by its nature, limited
set of cabin options.
SIZE
MATTERS
While an airline with a relatively small fleet
can refurbish a set of aircraft or acquire a
new, small leased fleet relatively swiftly,
that’s not the case for a larger airline,
even with the additional leverage of airline
groups. But passengers don’t see that:
they just wonder why Small Airline X has
objectively better seats than Large Airline Y.
See our feature on p58 to find out how
larger airlines can perform retrofits more
quickly and efficiently.
and to drive innovation.
Adding new interiors suppliers at the beginning of
an airframe programme is higher risk than adding them
once the programme itself is mature, which the A330neo,
A350 and B787 are at this point.
That’s something of a threat to the larger suppliers,
and an opportunity for the smaller. Both will need to
work closely with airframers as a result.
Airbus has always had Stelia as an in-house option,
and Boeing’s partnership with Adient is proceeding,
if quietly, although the addition of the economy seat
business unit of Lift by EnCore in December is notable.
At the other extreme are the supersuppliers like
Safran Seats, part of the wider Safran group, and Collins
Aerospace, part of UTC. These consolidated suppliers
are increasingly supplying a greater percentage of the
nose-to-tail aircraft interior.
Yet engaging with airframers is vital. The progress
made by Lift by EnCore in creating seats that
harmonised geometrically, physically and
aesthetically with Boeing’s cabins was impressive.
There remain too many seats in all classes that
very much look and feel like they were designed
separately to the cabin, jutting up in odd places,
wasting space, and with ugly cutout pieces to fill any
gaps. And even on the newest aircraft, many welcome
areas and cabin monuments feel neither welcoming nor
monumental. Look and feel isn’t everything, but boarding
an aircraft and standing in a queue while you stare at
a dinged up aluminium galley insert is hardly the
experience most airlines are selling.
The most crucial question for the world of aircraft
interiors may well be: in a decade that looks set to be
characterised by instability, with increasing global
uncertainty, and when external factors are emerging
more quickly than ever, how is the industry resilient to
shocks, flexible to pivot to changing demands, and able
to get business done in this new reality?
“ Airframers are
looking to increase
supplier diversity”
THE CRAIC C929 COULD BRING
NEW IDEAS TO THE INFLIGHT
PASSENGER EXPERIENCE.
IMAGE: MARC LACOSTE
This can be both a threat and an opportunity,
depending on the companies involved. Airframers are
looking to increase the diversity of supplier products
they can draw upon, both to mitigate the risks of any
one supplier falling behind on production or quality,
aircraftinteriorsinternational.com
078 MARCH 2020
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