Seamless Air Alliance Adds 5 Members, Hopes to Demo In-Flight Tech This Year

The Seamless Air Alliance, working toward the next generation of in-flight connectivity, announced five new members ahead of Mobile World Congress, it said Wednesday. Adaptive Channel, Etihad Airways, GlobalReach Technology, Safran and SitaOnAir joined the organization, announced at MWC 2018, which also includes Airbus, Delta Air Lines, Air France-KLM, OneWeb, Sprint, Inmarsat, Intelsat, Nokia and Panasonic. The alliance has set up a research laboratory and established three working groups writing specifications for technology, requirements and operations, it said. The alliance’s mission is to enable air travelers “to use their own devices to automatically connect to the Internet with no complicated login process nor paywall to scramble over,” it said. It plans to demonstrate the technology this year.