SkyFive, an air-to-ground (ATG) provider for the aviation sector, has created an an independent sister company – SkyFive Inflight Connectivity (Beijing) – which is dedicated to developing a 5G ATG inflight connectivity solution for airlines in China.
China has become the world’s largest airline passenger market, and to fully cater for the needs of increasingly connected aircraft flying in the dense Chinese airspace, the country’s government decided to focus on 5G-based ATG communications to provide aerial broadband connectivity services at a low cost per bit.
The creation of the Chinese company follows SkyFive’s announcement in August 2020 of a partnership with Airbus to develop a 5G ATG solution for the Chinese market. Only five months after the announcement, the system was demonstrated to leading Chinese airlines at the Airbus Innovation Center in Shenzhen, with positive results reported. SkyFive Inflight Connectivity (Beijing) will take the lead on further developing the solution, with support from the SkyFive team in Germany.
