Inflight Middle East: How Will IFEC Transform Ancillary Revenue for Airlines?

What’s keeping airline execs up at night? Are they thinking about how IFEC will change how they do business? That’s the topic for discussion at the Inflight Middle East conference in Dubai this year, January 23-24. Robin is excited to be speaking as part of the Ancillary Revenue panel. If you’re headed to Dubai, let’s connect!

Inflight connectivity is becoming an ordinary part of air travel, making it easier for airlines to sell to passengers. IFEC also creates a more enjoyable passenger experience with streaming content and onboard retail. Robin will be looking at some of the questions airlines should be asking:

• How are airlines exploiting new revenue opportunities yielded by increased connectivity?
• Often overlooked, connectivity is opening up new opportunities for ancillary revenues, such as tailored destination content, Wi-Fi sponsorship, duty free purchases and more.
• How should airlines be exploiting this? Who’s leading the way so far? How will passengers benefit?

We’re expecting a great panel, with lots of insight into IFEC and its potential for airline commerce.

Inflight Connectivity and Ancillary Revenue

The London School of Economics found that inflight broadband could be a $130 billion global market within the next 20 years, adding $30 billion of ancillary revenue for airlines by 2035.

Are airlines ready for this? How do they plan to capture more ancillary revenue?

Air travel is a unique opportunity for retailers – where else do they have an audience of millions, for hours at a time, with nowhere to go and money to spend? Still, onboard retail has been a missed opportunity – airlines convert just 7.5% of passengers into sales. Airlines are sitting on a goldmine of customer data but are missing the “front line” technology needed to translate data into business intelligence, and put it to use on each flight for more ancillary merchandising.

In an airline industry where margins are razor-thin, ancillary revenue is a “must have” and will only grow more important as IFEC opens up airlines’ ability to sell. It’s one reason why we built the new airline commerce platform, to help airlines drive more revenue. The platform’s official commercial release coincides with Inflight Middle East, so this is a great time for Guestlogix.

Guestlogix at Inflight Middle East

We’re hoping to get the pulse of the airline industry at Inflight Middle East and brainstorm on the new possibilities IFEC creates for onboard retail. Are you going to be at the conference? Join our product and marketing chief, Robin Hopper, January 23 from 14.30-15.15 on the Ancillary Revenue panel for a great talk on airline commerce.

If you’re not attending Inflight Middle East, schedule a demo today to learn more about the new Guestlogix airline commerce platform. We hope to see you in Dubai!