Aviation
KLM claims airline first with WhatsApp Business Platform
KLM Royal Dutch Airlines has announced that it is the first airline, and one of the first companies around the world, to join the WhatsApp Business platform.
The airline will now offer customers booking confirmation, check-in notification, boarding passes, flight status updates on the WhatsApp messaging service, and answer customer questions around the world in 10 different languages.
The new service is part of a pilot program by WhatsApps to extend its reach beyond personal messaging and into business applications. WhatsApp has created a dedicated enterprise solution which is being rolled out in a limited number of countries with broader availability in the coming weeks.
KLM president & CEO Pieter Elbers says of the new service:
“I am very proud that KLM is the world’s first airline with a verified WhatsApp account. This unique partnership with WhatsApp underlines our position as an aviation pioneer.
“We want to be where our customers are and, given the 1 billion users, you have to be on WhatsApp. With an account verified by WhatsApp, we offer our customers worldwide a reliable way to receive their flight information and ask questions 24/7. This truly is a major next step in our social media strategy.”
KLM has been consistently adding platforms and discovering new digital platforms on which to connect and transact business with customers over the past few years.
Beyond offering customer services on Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn, the airline has also added Facebook Messenger service, WeChat services, recently adding WeChat Pay, and is also active on Korea’s KakaoTalk.
The airline maintains a staff of 250 dedicated agents on its social media team who process over 100,000 weekly mentions, about 15,000 of which are questions or comments.
Still, KLM has experimented with AI to boost the performance of human service agents, working with DigitalGenius in San Francisco to accelerate the responsiveness of its CRM tools, making it easier for agents to find the information customers need.
KLM director of social media Karlijn Vogel-Meijer explains that the addition of the WhatsApp platform is just another way for customers to reach the airline, in line with a strategy by KLM to be everywhere customers might be already, rather than forcing customers into one specific platform or another.
“For a company like KLM, it’s very important to be where your customers are.”
What WhatsApp brings to the table are numbers. The airline finds the statistics of international adoption warrant adding the new platform. For example, in Brazil, 85% of all citizens actively use WhatsApp.
It is also a significantly more popular messaging platform in the Netherlands than Facebook Messenger. In the US market, Messenger is predominant. In Asia, and particularly in China, KLM customers prefer WeChat. By adapting its CRM to all of these platforms, the airline can better serve all customers, Vogel-Meijer explains.
Airlines
Global Airlines to contract Hi Fly to accelerate A380 Entry into Service
- Under the agreement, Global Airlines will benefit from Hi Fly’s expertise to accelerate the Entry into Service (EIS) programme for the airline’s new fleet.
- Hi Fly, based in Lisbon, has significant A380 technical and operating experience.
- First Global aircraft expected to fly to Europe in the months ahead, with a new registration of 9H-GLOBL
In a significant operational move, Global Airlines and Hi Fly have inked a contract to collaborate on the development and maintenance of the four A380 aircraft the new airline has agreed to purchase.
Hi Fly, the first company to operate the A380 on the secondary market, will collaborate with Global as it gets ready to launch operations to help the new carrier realize its goal of giving passengers the best possible experience when flying commercially.
Hi Fly takes delivery of its first Airbus A380(Opens in a new browser tab)
The EIS and Return to Service (RTS) procedures for Global’s first aircraft, which are anticipated to start in the coming months, are the organisation’s immediate priorities. However, with an affinity for the aircraft and confidence in its long-term potential and popularity, both businesses will look at further possibilities to deepen their partnership.
Hi Fly holds authorization to operate worldwide and currently operates 35,000 flights per year for a base of 140 airlines and governments on a global basis.
Airlines
Lufthansa equips short- and medium-haul aircraft with new cabins
- − Four makes eight: Large overhead compartments hold up to twice as many suitcases
- − For the first time on short-haul routes: holder for tablets and smartphones at every seat
- − More legroom with new ergonomic seats
Customers of Lufthansa will soon enjoy a redesigned cabin environment on short- and medium-haul flights. It provides a great deal of comfort and luxury. The business will gradually outfit 38 Airbus A320s already operating for Lufthansa with the new cutting-edge cabin beginning in spring 2025.
More space for carry-on luggage: The 40 percent larger compartments allow for the vertical stowage of carry-on items much more quickly and comfortably. As a result, huge overhead bins may accommodate up to twice as many carry-on suitcases or bags as the conventional “bins”.
Boeing and Qatar Airways Finalize Order for 25 737 MAX Airplanes(Opens in a new browser tab)
Each seat has a designated USB connector that can be used by Lufthansa to charge electronic devices. For the first flight ever, Lufthansa is providing a unique holder for tablets and smartphones in each seat. This allows visitors to watch films and television shows on their own devices much more conveniently without having to hold the gadgets in their hands or set them down on the folding table.
Increased legroom: The new seats from the Italian company Geven also provide extra legroom with the same seat spacing, through the ergonomically shaped backrests.
Airlines
China Eastern Airlines Inks $9.9 Billion Deal for 100 COMAC C919 Jets
China Eastern Airlines has committed to purchase 100 more COMAC C919 narrowbody planes. The airline is the C919’s first customer and currently operates a small number of aircraft.
Deliveries under this new arrangement will commence in 2024, with COMAC delivering five aircraft during the year. China Eastern will take another ten per year from 2025 to 2027, followed by 15 per year from 2028 to 2030. COMAC will deliver the final batch of 20 aircraft in 2031. The airline valued the new contract at about $9.9 billion at list pricing, but underlined that it had purchased the planes at a substantial discount.
China Eastern Airlines set to operate C919’s first commercial flight(Opens in a new browser tab)
The agreement comes five months after China Eastern conducted the inaugural flight of the Chinese passenger plane, which state-owned COMAC had built to compete with the single-aisle jet families of Airbus SE’s A320neo and Boeing Co’s 737 MAX.
The state-owned carrier with its headquarters in Shanghai is the C919’s first customer; it has purchased five of the aircraft, three of which have already been delivered. Later this year, the other two are anticipated to be delivered.
Airbus Inks $17B Plane Order With China(Opens in a new browser tab)
According to China Eastern, the new aircraft would expand its fleet at a time when air travel is experiencing a robust rebound after three years of COVID limitations and as the airline prepares to retire a significant portion of its narrow-body aircraft due to ageing.
Between 2020 and 2039, COMAC estimates that about 40,600 new aircraft will be delivered on the global market, with a value of roughly 5.9 trillion dollars. The company’s Chinese C919 and ARJ21 planes could deliver a total of 732 billion dollars worth of products.
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