Originally Posted by
Tag1987
I think it’s just mainly that it’s expensive compared to QF and VA - especially on domestic sectors which can often be a similar length to a TT flight. I think it’s a pretty valid point especially since these are the airlines that AirNZ should be trying to compete with - not UA.
Qantas are very lucky because they use the Ka band Viasat Sky Muster satellites that were deployed for the nbn network - they in effect are able to leverage this and have access to bandwidth that's down-linked inside Australia at a far cheaper cost than any other provider. It does just have they small problem that they can't provide service on Trans Tasman services because the spot beams only cover Australia.
Committing themselves to Viasat does however have the one main downside that Viasat currently don't have a global Ka network and won't do for a number of years. This is why Qantas won't be able to offer WiFi across their long-haul fleet for a few years yet - the Viasat-3 satellite covering the North America is planned to launch in 2020, the one covering Europe scheduled for early 2021, and Asia Pacific expected later in 2021.
Virgin are having to compete with older Ku tech with the advantage they're also using an older Optus satellite covering Australia and Intelsat elsewhere - and I'd imaging paying a lot less for the capacity above Australia that they are for international services but can average the two out. Air NZ have the disadvantage of probably paying quite a bit more for their global Ka solution with Inmarsat.