Subject: RE: 13 AIRLINES!!!! - full text...
From milplease
PostID 312442 On Friday, February 06, 2004 (EST) at 2:58:27 PM
Response To: milplease PostID 312441
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Coming soon to an airplane near you
JOHN GILLIE; The News Tribune
An upstart Tacoma company founded by a former airline baggage handler Thursday announced the first substantial fruits of its foray into the airborne entertainment business.
SeaTac-based Alaska Airlines this week agreed to buy up to 6,000 of APS Inc.'s novel portable airborne entertainment systems, the digEplayer.
APS President Bill Boyer said Alaska's three-month test of the digEplayer on transcontinental flights was so successful the airline will eventually offer them on every flight longer than 2 1/2 hours.
Boyer worked part-time for 15 years as an Alaska Airlines baggage handler before founding the electronics company.
The 2.4-pound player, which resembles a small laptop computer, can be propped up on the seat-back tray. It contains a 20-gigabyte hard drive, a 10-hour battery and a 7-inch screen.
A row of simple buttons allows users to select from up to 30 feature-length movies, a handful of television programs and 10 hours of digital music.
During its three-month test, Alaska provided the players free to first-class passengers on its flights from Sea-Tac Airport to Boston; Newark, N.J.; Washington, D.C.; Orlando, Fla.; and Miami. It rented the players to coach passengers for $10 a trip if they paid on board or $8 if they reserved and paid for the player beforehand on the Internet.
''There was some question whether passengers would pay $10 a flight for the player,'' Boyer said. ''But that concern was unfounded. Alaska was selling out of them at $10 apiece.''
Boyer, whose portable entertainment system has been favorably reviewed in airborne electronics publications, said he expects to make more sales announcements soon.
''We're working with 13 airlines and a corporate jet company about equipping their fleets with the players,'' he said.
Dave Palmer, managing director of marketing for Alaska said the test resulted in several improvements to the player that have made it even more desirable.
''We have been delighted with the results in each case, and have now made a full commitment to the product,'' he said.
Boyer said the players proved more durable than even he had hoped.
''We were afraid there would be damage to the screens or to the mechanism that held them open,'' he said.
Of the 1,000 players Alaska used in the test, only one screen failed, and only a half-dozen had other mechanical problems - which were promptly fixed, he said.
''We found some minor software bugs, but we've got them 90 percent fixed,'' he said.
And the airline lost only one of the players, he said.
APS has a contract with Fox Entertainment to provide content for the players. It recently signed an agreement with the Disney Co. to broaden the repertoire of entertainment available on the players.
Alaska plans to offer the players on its Anchorage-Sea-Tac routes this summer. That trip is about 3 1/2 hours long.
The airline will gradually widen the availability of the players to include other long flights, such as those from the Northwest to Mexico.
Boyer's venture grew out of Alaska's request to its employees about how it could provide entertainment on long flights without expensive retrofitting of its aircraft. Alaska began flying coast-to-coast just before the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
Boyer, who also operates a day spa and an espresso bar, approached Palmer with the idea of the portable movie player.
Portable players offered several advantages to Alaska:
•They can be moved from plane to plane as demand requires.
One of the problems Alaska had with installing permanent systems in its planes was that it doesn't use the same planes every day on coast-to-coast flights. That meant the airline would have to install the systems on dozens of planes to ensure they were always available on those flying coast-to-coast.
Some of those planes, however, would be used on shorter routes where entertainment systems would not be needed.
•They're a fraction of the weight and cost of a permanent system.
Players that would supply typical usage on an entire Boeing 737-700 weigh a total of 115 pounds, Boyer said. A permanent system would weigh 2,000 pounds.
A wired-in system would cost at least $500,000 a plane. The digEplayers cost a fraction of that.
•If a player malfunctions, the flight attendant can replace it with another. If the permanent system fails, the passenger is out of luck for the flight. It might be days before a technician can fix it.
SIDEBAR: What's playing?
To see what movies and television shows are available on Alaska Airlines this month, go to www.digeplayer.com/now_showing.php.
A few highlights:
Movies: ''Antwone Fisher,'' ''Daredevil,'' ''Down with Love''
TV shows: ''Dharma & Greg,'' ''Family Guy,'' ''NYPD Blue''
(Published 12:01AM, February 6th, 2004)
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