Hello from bizjournals.com! David Mueller (dmueller7@lycos.com) thought you might like the following article from The Denver Business Journal: http://www.bizjournals.com/industries/travel/airlines_airports/2003/02/03/denver_story6.html Frontier gives flying couch potatoes a chance to watch satellite television Amy Bryer ------------------------------------------------------------ Denver-based Frontier Airlines is trying to help its passengers maintain their couch potato status with the help of a personal live television in every seat. Frontier started installing the television sets in seat backs last year and it will have 17 airplanes, or about half of its fleet, equipped with the live television service by the end of March. Passengers are able to watch live television from a DirecTV satellite feed with patented equipment from LiveTV. Frontier's planes are outfitted with a flat antenna that spins in a circle and can adjust to stay pointed at three DirecTV satellites in space. The 33-inch by 6-inch antenna is covered by an aerodynamic dome that protects it and diminishes wind resistance as the plane travels at more than 500 miles per hour. LiveTV worked on the antenna design for nearly five years. The dome is barely noticeable, said DirecTV director of public relations Robert Mercer. "It's continuously tracking satellites orbiting 22,300 miles away in space, no matter what the plane is doing — pitching, rolling," Mercer said. Passengers have a choice of 24 channels, including news on CNN, sports from ESPN and family entertainment from Discovery. The plane carries 24 servers to download each channel from the antenna and then distribute them to the seats. "The programming is designed for air travel so it tries to cover the spectrum of viewing taste," Mercer said. Frontier chose to go with live television vs. canned programming to differentiate itself, said Frontier senior director of marketing and brand management Ian Arthur. The individual screens are better than the drop-down screens used on some airlines because they offer unobstructed viewing and more control over content, Arthur said. "With drop-down screens, you're looking around someone's head and you may not approve of the in-flight movie for your children," he said. With the DirecTV programming, passengers don't have to miss the Super Bowl or the president's State of the Union address, Arthur said. They also will not miss breaking news of airline accidents, but Arthur said Frontier can shut down the system in those cases. The service has been offered on flights to all of Frontier's 39 destination cities from DIA, but it's more popular on longer flights. Frontier's longest flight is four hours to Fort Lauderdale. Frontier will not disclose the details of its deal for the equipment from LiveTV, but LiveTV officials have been quoted as saying it costs them about $1 per seat per flight amortized over the life of the equipment and that they handle maintenance, programming, installation and credit-card collection. Frontier is charging $5 for use of the television; passengers pay by swiping their credit card at their seat. Competitor airline Jet Blue is offering the same service for free. It is the parent company of LiveTV. Revenue from the $5 is shared between LiveTV and Frontier. Frontier is charging for the service while Jet Blue doesn't because the two airlines don't compete on many routes, Arthur said. From Denver, the airlines only compete on flights to New York City. Designing the satellite system for airplanes was not as difficult as making it nearly hassle-free for the airlines, said LiveTV project engineer Brian Anderson. LiveTV wanted to make the service easy for crew members to use and maintain and also prevent the system from affecting how the plane flies, he said. Frontier will begin an aggressive ad campaign for its DirecTV service this spring. Copyright(c) American City Business Journals Inc. All rights reserved. You can view this article on the web at: http://www.bizjournals.com/industries/travel/airlines_airports/2003/02/03/denver_story6.html