In-flight mobile calls

If you can’t stand being out of contact when you’re on a plane, rejoice that from early 2007 you’ll be able to make in-flight calls from your mobile. Emirates airline plans to roll out the world’s first widespread commercial cellular service onboard its planes, and both Ryanair and Air France have announced similar plans for later in the year.

Emirates’ new scheme is in partnership with Sussex-based AeroMobile, a joint venture between Norway’s Telenor and US transport communications provider ARINC. At the heart of the new system is the Altobridge AM Gateway platform, a wireless protocol enabling passengers to text and chat in the air in a manner similar to existing international roaming.

As Altobridge’s CEO Mike Fitzgerald explains, ‘The concept of roaming has taken off and been easily adopted by the world’s mobile networks, with straightforward billing to customers. We’ve simply taken it a stage further.’
Emirates plans to extend the scheme so passengers will be able to use the internet onboard and make use of GPRS capabilities on BlackBerrys and PDAs. Emirates chairman and chief executive Sheikh Ahmed bin Saeed Al Maktoum stresses that, ‘mobile phone use will respect the privacy of all customers.’