Legacy Airlines Look to Asia for Travel Technology Innovations
Skift Take
Traditional airlines don’t ever want to be caught unprepared again, as they were when low-cost carriers disrupted their gig. And Asia is where they look to for a head start on travel tech innovations. Never see legacies as geriatric ever again.
Lufthansa Group opened the first foreign offshoot of its innovation hub last week in Singapore, focusing on the future of work and how it might transform business travel. As well, it dove into the future of travel mobility.
The very next day, Singapore Airlines opened KrisLab, which will look at technology such as blockchain, mixed reality devices, artificial intelligence and data analytics to enhance its operations and overall customer experience.
Both legacy carriers have been on a digital drive, Lufthansa since 2014 when it set up its Innovation Hub in Berlin, and Singapore Airlines when it launched a digital innovation blueprint in early 2018.
Lufthansa Group’s Vice President of Digital Strategy Christian Langer told Skift in an interview in Singapore that the airline would hire four to five people, based at its corporate office in the city, to do research and seek strategic partners. This could grow to 30 staff eventually, as it wants to be embedded in the Asian ecosystem of travel technology startups, digital enterprises and academia, not just be an outsider looking in but an insider participating in the market.
A partnership with INSEAD in Singapore has already been inked, while discussions are afoot with WeWork, Grab, Singapore Changi Airport and Munich Airport to jump onboard its first focus areas in Asia.
Why the focus on future of work and travel mobility
“How we do business across distances is
