Aircraft Interiors: Rockwell Collins ripostes in single-aisle struggle
Rockwell Collins has landed orders from three airlines for more than 60 examples of its dPAVES digital broadcast IFE system.
In the perfect riposte to rival Thales’ unveiling of its new TopSeries Digital Single-Aisle system, the US avionics giant has named Air Arabia and Air Europa as new takers for dPAVES, while existing customer CanJet has ordered another two shipsets.
Sharjah-based low-fare operator Air Arabia wants dPAVES for a total of 49 Airbus A320s. At the core of the system to be installed in the aircraft is the 4MCU Broadcast Digital Server (BDS), offering 160Gb of content storage – enough for several entertainment play periods - and Airshow 3D moving-map.
dPAVES also incorporates the Flyable Data Loader, designed to cut the time and resources need to add new content. Fifty gigabytes can be loaded within five minutes via a single Blu-Ray disc and then automatically transferred to the server. The server can continue to deliver content to passengers while the loader is working.
Spanish leisure carrier Air Europa plans to install dPAVES installation in 12 of its Boeing 737s and has options on a further 13 shipsets. Canadian charter airline CanJet has ordered the system for a pair of Boeing 737-800s.