Historically, inflight entertainment content processing has been notoriously slow, with new-run movie titles landing on board aircraft sometimes weeks after they’ve been made available to the consumer video-on-demand market.
But major airline content service provider (CSP) Anuvu is helping to change the game. The Lombard, Illinois-headquartered firm has built an AI pipeline that it says has cut IFE content processing time by 65% — turning a typical four-week manual delivery window “into something dramatically faster, without compromising compliance or quality.”
Given that the IFE market is steadily growing, and requirements are complex — a typical title needs roughly five dubbing languages and eight subtitle languages per airline — the decision is quite timely.
“Over 900 passenger airlines fly worldwide, with hundreds offering some form of IFE, each managing content standards route by route, market by market,” notes an Anuvu spokesperson. She suggests that the IFE content market is set to grow to $931 million by 2029.
Seeing the writing on the wall, Anuvu (formerly Global Eagle) several years ago created a cloud-based backbone for content delivery, and embedded rights management into the solution.
The so-called Open platform, which uses Amazon Web Services (AWS) as the core framework, ingests, selects, edits and delivers over 18,000 files per cycle and has allowed the company to support 4K HD and HDR delivery to new IFE systems.
What’s new is that Anuvu has now built AI into that same Open ecosystem, integrating two new tools — one for localization (dubbing and subtitling) and one for aviation-specific compliance checks — into how it processes and delivers content.
The result, it says, is faster turnaround on new titles and routes, without losing the human sign-off and audit trail compliance demands. This, in turn, is speeding up delivery and improving output quality.
But what does this development mean operationally for airlines, and indeed the passenger experience? We interviewed Anuvu vice president, global content and ops Kosh Hussain to learn more. Please enjoy our full Q&A.
RGN: On average, how much faster is Anuvu’s AWS-based Open platform able to process and deliver content with these two new AI tools, as opposed to in the past? Are we talking days or perhaps weeks’ worth of time savings? When were the AI tools first utilized by Anuvu?
Hussain: We have seen a 65% reduction in time needed for specific content processes since introducing these tools into our pipeline. Open has been able to encode a movie in only minutes for several years now, however, it’s not only about speed. The addition of AI tools are helping us become more efficient in traditionally manual tasks and processes.
To put that in real terms, a process that historically took around four weeks from content ingest to delivery-ready output can now be completed in a fraction of that time, without compromising compliance or quality. For example, we can screen a 120-minute movie in 20 minutes compared to three hours needed for a human screener. We began rolling these tools into production in 2024, and we have been continuously refining the workflow as we have scaled it across our operations.
RGN: It’s our understanding that agentic AI is now offered baseline as part of AWS. Would you describe these two AI tools as agentic AI, with Anuvu incorporating a human-in-the-loop approach once the actions are executed through the multi-step workflow?
Hussain: That’s a fair characterization. Both tools operate across multi-step workflows, one handling localization,(subtitling) and the other handling aviation-specific compliance checks, and they can sequence and execute those steps with a good degree of autonomy. But we have been very deliberate that this is an augmentation, not automation for automation’s sake. Every piece of content still passes through our human quality control teams before it goes out the door. The AI does the heavy lifting on the repetitive, time-intensive work; our people apply the judgment, context, and final sign-off that content, especially in aviation, absolutely requires.
RGN: Is closed captioning also facilitated by the AI tools?
Hussain: Yes, closed captioning sits within the same localization tool that handles subtitling for other languages. Broadly, our localization tool is built to handle the full text and language layer of a title, so it’s a natural extension of the subtitling workflow rather than a separate process. Closed captioning is becoming more in demand from our airline clients and we are in a great position to be able to deliver at scale and speed to ensure airlines are compliant with specific rules surrounding this.
RGN: Can Anuvu give us an idea of the volume of 4K content now being supplied to the aviation market (has it greatly increased over the last year)?
Hussain: 4K deliveries are up 20% year-on-year. What we can say directionally is that demand for higher-fidelity content in the cabin has grown quickly, driven by better screens, improved systems, and airlines wanting the inflight environment to feel more like what passengers experience at home. That’s part of the reason we have invested in a pipeline capable of handling that volume and complexity without extending delivery timelines. We have been delivering true 4K files in a live cabin environment since 2021.
RGN: Anuvu customer Cathay Pacific is introducing what it says is the “world’s first 4K HDR10+ inflight content”, paired with Panasonic Avionics’ Astrova screens (coming to new A321neos.) How will Open plus the new AI tools streamline delivery for Cathay?
Hussain: We’ve worked closely with Cathay Pacific for many years to help push the boundaries of the cabin experience, and this is very much the next chapter in that relationship. Our team has been supporting the vision for 4K in the cabin for a long time now, well before the infrastructure and screen technology existed to fully realize it, so seeing that ambition converge with Panasonic’s Astrova screens is genuinely exciting for us.
Higher-resolution, HDR-mastered content brings more complexity into the pipeline, larger files, more exacting technical specifications, etc. Our lab, paired with our AI localization and compliance tools, is what allows us to manage that complexity at scale without slowing delivery, so Cathay’s 4K HDR10+ titles can move through subtitling and compliance checks at the same pace as the rest of our catalog. We are looking forward to seeing this content onboard very soon.
RGN: To be clear, even as Anuvu embraces these new tools, there will be no headcount reduction at the firm?
Hussain: Correct. These tools were designed from the outset to empower our teams, not replace them. The change is in the nature of the work: our teams spend less time on repetitive, manual processing and more time on quality judgment, edge cases and the parts of the process that genuinely need a human eye.
In fact, the focus has shifted; we’re spending more time on quality control and curation, creating more jobs as technology evolves in line with the growing requirements for IFE and passenger experience.
RGN: If an airline wants to update its content more regularly (say, faster than a 30-day cycle), is Anuvu able to accommodate them more easily now that it’s using these AI tools? What’s the fastest turnaround that can be offered?
Hussain: Yes, an airline-led timeline is a meaningful shift the pipeline has enabled. A 30-day cycle was, in many cases, a result of lengthy, manual localization and compliance checks, which were necessary for the system OEM to conduct a full review of the content package. With processing time cut by 65%, we’re able to support more frequent refresh cycles, meaning more content with fewer restrictions.
We work with some of the world’s largest and most prestigious airlines. With the latest connectivity offerings and OEM systems, these airlines expect to move towards two different approaches: one for the traditional monthly content processing, and another for flexible content delivery. Content owners are playing a very important role in these discussions.
RGN: Anuvu offers airlines visibility into their content options via its Explore online entertainment library. This can be paired with Iris, Anuvu’s content subscription service. Are most of Anuvu’s airline customers utilizing these services? Does Anuvu see any opportunities for exploiting AI to transform Explore into a predictive recommendation engine? (Or perhaps that is already in play?)
Hussain: Explore is a key part of Anuvu’s digital supply chain and is used by the majority of our airline clients, regardless of the commercial model they have with us. It gives both our teams and airline teams visibility into their IFE lineup and enables them to work together on content curation. We see the continued digitalization of these workflows as an important part of the future of the industry, and will evolve based on feedback from our clients and teams.
The opportunity to use AI to make Explore a more predictive recommendation engine is absolutely a natural next step for us. We are already using AI to accelerate how content gets to the aircraft, and the logical extension is to use AI to help airlines decide what content to select in the first place: surfacing titles based on factors such as route, audience and viewing patterns, rather than relying solely on manual curation. Some of these capabilities are already in development, with launches expected toward the end of the year.
RGN: Does Anuvu ever take the reins on selecting the content for its airline customers, if requested? Are airline IFE managers still deeply involved in this part of the process?
Hussain: Yes, we offer both models depending on what our clients prefer. Some IFE teams want to be closely involved in every title selection, and we support that with the data and recommendations to make those decisions faster. Others prefer to lean on the expertise of our content teams and hand curation back to us for full direction, particularly airlines without a dedicated IFE content function. We treat every client as an individual, offering a flexible approach as requested.
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Featured image credited to Jason Rabinowitz
