Lufthansa Technik AG has modified the first VIP aircraft, an Airbus A340, with high-speed Ka-band satellite communication technology, powered by Inmarsat’s Global Xpress service.

Lufthansa Technik is the first MRO company in Europe to receive the Supplemental Type Certificate (STC) from EASA to install Ka-band antenna systems on an Airbus A340 aircraft. After successfully installing such a system on an A319 as well, Lufthansa Technik now holds STCs for Airbus A320 family and A340 aircraft. In addition, Lufthansa Technik will also receive STCs for Boeing 737BBJ and Airbus A330 before the end of 2016. The STC serves to verify that the modifications to an aircraft conform to the design specifications stipulated by EASA.

Future Lufthansa Technik customers, regardless of whether they operate airlines or VIP cabin outfitted planes, will benefit from the already existing STCs in terms of both cost and aircraft ground time. Furthermore, Lufthansa Technik has gained vast experience from installing the system to various aircraft and learned, together with the system manufactures, to overcome teething troubles relating to engineering, production and material issues.

“Over the past months our engineers and avionic specialists have done a great job to get the approvals from the authorities for different aircraft types of both VIP and commercial customers. Again, we have proven to be a pioneer in integrating state-of-the-art technology on board”, said Walter Heerdt, Senior Vice President of VIP & Special Mission Aircraft Services. “We take pride in being the first VIP completion and maintenance center to make this ultra-highspeed internet above the clouds a reality.”

The new technology enables passengers to use the full spectrum of aircraft cabin applications such as email, web, access to VPN networks, voice capabilities, video conferencing, cloud computing and ecommerce.

Featured image credited to istock.com/JakeOlimb