if they allowed passengers to use that as a work monitor that would be a massive win.

I just find it really ironic that the product is heavily marketed as “Quiet Luxury” yet we have a gaudy 24-inch screen in our face.

Perfect size for doing complicated excel. Or finding wally

"Petite" might be most apt.

It's an interesting idea for sure.

Connectivity: Bluetooth doesn't have the bandwidth and I think WiFi might also fall short, but would need to look more into that... but if WiFi was the answer I suspect a direct laptop-monitor connection would be preferable to going via the plane's inflight system, so it might just come down to have a HDMI socket somewhere (same location as AC/USB?) and the traveller bringing a suitable cable. Sounds like old-school but most reliable and also would provide the best throughput and performance without lag.

Privacy: so here's the thing, I would be loathe to put my work on the big screen for any passenger passing by (or the person behind me, if they stand up a bit) to see. It's not that I do anything Top Secret on my laptop, but
a) there are times I'm writing under embargo or whatever and I'd hate to be penning something on say The Bridge re-opening or 777 Halo first class and a fellow CX passenger sees that up on that big 24" screen
b) as a journo I will confess to being by nature curious and inquisitive (yeah, okay, 'nosy' if you want!) and that includes a quick not-obvious clocking of whatever somebody is doing on their laptop. I have picked up a bit of intel and inside info doing this over 30+ years as a journo, and even outside my own realm it sometimes astounds me to see people working on sensitive info such as high-end 'commercial in confidence' business proposals, reports, financial forecasts etc in Word and PowerPoint.

Obviously the answer here is to NOT do anything 'confidential' and maybe not too 'personal' when connected to the big IFE screen - pretty straightforward! - so I suspect many business travellers would choose not to use the monitor as an external display for that reason, which would diminish the use-case.

But for watching BYO entertainment, especially binge-viewing a bunch of episodes, on the 24" Aria Suites screen instead of my 13" MacBook Air, I'd be all in for sure!

Nah, 'gaudy' would be having the bezel finished in gold leaf and faux walnut trim :P

The product team over at EK are taking notes.

Except there are airline aspects too: eg loyalty (not just Asia Miles which is more a currency, but the ex-MPC Cathay program and associated status tiers & perks), 'digital experience' includes the website and app, there are several aspects of the role which are very airline passenger-facing and directly relate to those passengers.

It's actually a very broad portfolio, when you look more closely at it, and almost makes me wonder if it's not too big, or at least too big for any one person, especially when you factor in that it's not just about covering the running all those aspects now but planning for next stages and next steps, and then allowing that you'd probably spend more than half your time in meetings.

Anyway, Vivian's replacement sounds super-solid, very well-versed in product and the passenger experience. And they'll have a lot on their plate beyond Aria, eg Halo, A330 and A330 neo product, The Bridge, The Wing First, The Wing Business, and that's just some the stuff we know about.

Well, the current state of the airline industry tends to be that the money is no longer earned with the flying business, though with the auxiliaries, especially the loyalty and credit card stuff. Already big in the US, growing in other parts of the world.

So, I'd say it's a promotion .....

I'm definitely reading this as a promotion, a real 'step up' for Vivian. As mentioned earlier this is a massive portfolio with both internal and external aspects, and Cathay/Swire would not have asked her to take it on unless they were 100% confident in her abilities.

Not to mention the "Director" title, which is a major step up from "General Manager" which CX has quite a number of them. We can expect to see Vivian and her official bio in the management team page soon!

did not realise how many CX corporate psychophants sre on this forum.

not sure how after 6 years of development and not launching a revolutionary product merits a promotion lol.
but sure...

The 2027 Cathay Pacific 777X first class seat designs are based on the OMAAT article posted back in August 2023 https://onemileatatime.com/news/new-...c-first-class/

I’ve booked a flight mid March from HKG to LHR on flight CX255 which should be the new Aria suite. Is there any risk it will be the old 777 business class or would any aircraft change just be to the A350?

There's definitely risk, since they only have a couple planes currently outfitted w/ Aria. All it takes is one of them to go tech and you've got a likely plane swap. (I think part of your question might be, "is there any risk that CX changes its mind operationally and doesn't send to LHR as is currently on the schedule", to this I think the answer is "low risk".) Nothing you can really do about this since it's such a small subfleet right now.

As to what plane they'd sub, I'm not as familiar with LHR patterns, but the "old 777 business class" is hardly bad. It's quite similar to the A350 business class. And some of us would argue at least in the case of some seats, the 777 is better than the A350. It's definitely not like some massive downgrade or something the 77W J vs. A359/351 J IMO. Especially since all the birds have WiFi now (and 77Ws overall have faster WiFi than the A350s).