Skift Business Traveler: A Premium Airline Is Born While Two Budget Airlines Fade

What to Know Now

Gogo had its media day in my home town of Chicago this past Tuesday, and I stopped by for a visit. The main takeaway: their currently mediocre bandwidth is improving rapidly to match their superior customer service. While it’s up to each airline to update their service from the painfully slow ATG to the upcoming ATG-4 and satellite services, the road has been paved to faster, more YouTube-friendly futures in flight. As long as the animated GIFs come in, I’ll be happy.

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Top Story

As one airline is born, another begins to sunset and a third starts getting uncomfortable. This week, French company La Compagnie (yes I realize that’s redundant) announced all-business-class flights from New York to Paris with service set to launch on July 11. The 757 that they’ll operate features a 74 seat cabin with angled-flat seats and premium French amenities. Best of luck to them in this competitive market.

At the same time, Singapore’s Tiger Airways, the low cost carrier based out of Indonesia, announced that it will cease operations as of July 1 while Air Berlin, one of OneWorld’s newest members, attempts to reposition itself as the “convergence” of low-cost and legacy. Our Editor in Chief put it best on the Tiger Airways Skift Take: Is this the year of the great low-cost carrier shakeout??

Social Quote of the Day

More like a wanna-be low-rent knock-off. MT @hharteveldt: L’Avion redux MT @airchive: La Compagnie to offer all-premium CDG-EWR

 – @WanderngAramean | Seth Miller – Loyalty marketing, connectivity, #PaxEx and airline industry news, too.

Airlines

New Business Class Airline Looks to Class Up NYC-Paris Air Travel: A new business class airline wants to reinvent the way business travelers fly from New York City to Paris. The carrier La Compagnie will launch this July with four to five weekly flights between Newark International and Charles de Gaulle Airport. Read more at Skift

The New Look of British Airways’ Short-Haul Cabins:  British Airways have just released images of their brand new interiors for their short haul fleet. The airline has announced it will be refitting 95 (not all) of its short haul fleet with these slick new contemporary designs, which fit closer in-line to their long haul fleet offering. Read more at Skift

Delta stakes claim to be “The World’s Most Trusted Airline”: What’s the world’s most trusted airline? While that might be a matter of subjective opinion, Delta Air Lines Inc. wants to leave no room for doubt. Read more at the Atlanta Business Chronicle

Airports

Beacon Technology Will Transform How We Travel Through Airports: One of the highlights of this year’s SITA IT Summit in Brussels is a close look at the promise of beacons and intelligent mobility technology to simplify the travel experience. Read more at Skift

Air Canada Moves to London Heathrow’s New Terminal 2: The arrival of Air Canada flight AC856 from Toronto at 07:04 GMT marked the official move of all Air Canada flights and operations to London Heathrow Airport Terminal 2: The Queen’s Terminal. Read more at the Wall Street Journal

Tech

U.S. Local Transit Lines Rush to Introduce Mobile Ticketing: Mobile ticketing adoption is currently expected to plateau around 25 percent in the United States. Read more at Skift

The Amazon smartphone is here: meet the Fire Phone: A $199 phone with 3D cameras and all the Amazon services in the world. Read more at the Verge

How Much Closer Are Passengers to Making In-Flight Calls? As the FCC’s consultation period on the extension of access to mobile wireless devices onboard aircraft comes to an end, Airbus and SITA joint venture OnAir repeated its recommendation to the FCC and the FAA to define regulations in a manner which will allow airlines to decide whether or not to allow passengers to make calls in-flight. Read more at Skift

TripIt Thinks Business Travelers Will Get Into Photo-Sharing: Photo-sharing apps such as Pinterest, which has attracted one billion Place pins six months after launching them, are coming into their own.  But do they work for business travel? Read more at Skift

Hotels

New Report Says Hotels Unaware of Airbnb’s Upscale Product Quality:
Spend enough time with any hotel executive and the issue of Airbnb will come up eventually, with someone asking, “What impact do you think Airbnb is going to have on the hotel industry?” Read more at Skift

Fairfield Inn’s Attempt to Share Career Advice to Millennial Business Travelers: Fairfield Inn & Suites is reaching out to millennials with a career-oriented campaign aimed at celebrating innovators and their mentors. Read more at Skift

For Better WiFi Deals, Stay at Cheaper Hotels: These days, all travelers are connected travelers. Access to the Internet and to email are no longer luxuries, they’re necessities. And the availability of WiFi is only the beginning; it must also be free, and fast. Read more at FrequentFlier.com

Your turn

My good friend Kent Wien, a commercial pilot who used to write for me at Gadling, has taken some of his paragliding adventures over to Instagram. Check out his amazing and inspiring feed here.

Tips and Comments

Can be sent to gm@skift.com and @grantkmartin. We publish the Business Newsletter twice a week on Monday and Thursday.

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