Story ID: 637
Honeywell's GoDirect To Offer Data Control 
By: Curt Epstein
Caption: According to the company, by limiting how airborne connectivity is accessed, users can save thousands of dollars every year.
Word Count: 560
It’s been a year since Honeywell launched its GoDirect Cabin Services, based off its acquisition of Denmark-based satellite communications service provider SatCom1, and the company has announced new innovations at this year’s NBAA convention that its believes could save users money in their satellite communications bills.

“When we launched GoDirect Cabin Services, Honeywell realized there was a gap in the marketplace,” explained John Peterson, the company’s senior director of connectivity services. “Operators were upset about the fact that they had constant year-on-year rising costs in data, and they felt as though they had very little power or control over it.”

While users have come to expect their personal devices constantly updating while on the ground using Wi-Fi, in the air, that can result in serious costs from the devices automatically receiving data.

“What ends up happening in an aircraft environment where you’re paying by the minute or paying by the megabyte, is it’s kind of like leaving the lights on,” Peterson told AIN, adding that high-speed data plans can run into the tens-of-thousands of dollars per month.

Other data hogs include video downloads. If devices detect a high speed transmission pipe, they might attempt to download the highest quality video available, which if viewed on anything other than a very large screen monitor would be a waste, and would likely clog the data stream to the aircraft, slowing it, while raising costs.

As a result, Honeywell (Booth N5100) is introducing GoDirect Data Control, which will allow the operator specific control of data flow, as well as credit card and voucher billing for each personal device through its expanded GoDirect Cabin Connectivity suite. “We give operators the ability to control how much of their bandwidth they want to permit to the aircraft in real time,” said Peterson, adding the system can even automatically limit the flow of video to lower resolution. Users can even set alerts to notify them of exceptionally high data usage.

“If they feel like there’s a particular flight out there that is consuming too much data, too fast, they can actually push [the transmission rates] down, while the aircraft is in mid-flight,” said Peterson. “This can save operators up to $300,000 a year just by tuning the network very precisely around exactly the types of services they want to offer.”

Through the GoDirect portal, the transmission pipeline can be narrowed by the cockpit, or even by ground monitoring at the flight department’s headquarters, bringing “a higher level of cabin experience at a budget that the operator can depend upon month on month,” according to Peterson.

The company is also ramping up its airborne connectivity consulting services, providing expertise to even non-Honeywell customers on topics such as seamless integration of different systems on different aircraft and data consumption planning.

“We’re doing a lot more work with operators with respect to getting our aircraft network technology specialists into their hangars,” said Peterson. “What we’re finding out is they really need that little bit of extra help to say 'How do I set up my services so that I can deliver this level of service on this budget per month?' We took for granted that that would be intuitive to them.”