Avionics News February 2016 - 34

GOGO FOR YOUR FOMO
Continued from page 33

More than just Wi-Fi
Perhaps the company's most
innovative service is Gogo Biz, a
terrestrial cellular network covering
the 48 contiguous U.S. states, plus
portions of Alaska and Canada.
It delivers to the airborne user
broadband connectivity roughly
equivalent to what U.S. cellphone
customers would label 3G service,
allowing Internet surfing, emailing
with attachments and access to a
corporate virtual private network,
or VPN. Voice service also is
available, using a cabin handset or
the company's own Gogo Text &
Talk option, which allows passengers
to use their cellphone to send and

receive both calls and text messages
as if they never left the office. So
long, FOMO.
Connectivity is just part of
Gogo's offerings for business
aircraft, however. Gogo Vision is
an in-flight entertainment option
using an onboard server to deliver
approximately 200 on-demand
movies and television programs to
passengers, along with moving maps,
news, flight progress information and
destination weather. Gogo Vision
can be installed on business aircraft
as small as light jets and turboprops,
according to the company. It uses
Gogo's UCS 5000 "all-in-one"
router and media server to stream
content to portable devices. Operators
may update Gogo Vision's content
via USB thumb drives or choose

automatic updates via the "Gogo
Cloud," available in the U.S. at select
Signature Flight Support facilities.
Updates also are available back at an
operator's own hangar by installing
an optional wireless capability.
All that is for the passengers,
of course. What about the cockpit
crew? Gogo has something for
them, too. At November's National
Business Aviation Association
Convention & Exhibition, Gogo
announced a partnership with
Honeywell Aerospace to leverage
the cockpit and datalink services
from Honeywell's Global Data
Center. The partnership includes
Inmarsat Classic Aero (voice and
data services) plus flight planning,
datalink, graphical cockpit and
weather information, flight
following and concierge services.
Gogo also announced in
November that its in-flight
connections now may be used
with several popular cockpit and
operational applications. Those
applications include FlightAware,
ForeFlight, WSI Corp.'s Pilotbrief
Optima and Honeywell's MyGDC.
As John Wade, Gogo Business
Aviation's executive vice president
and general manager, put it at the
time, "To many pilots, the only
thing better than using the latest
generation of apps in the cockpit
is using them with a live Internet
connection, and that's what today's
announcement will bring." The
new capabilities are available
with Gogo's ATG 1000 hardware,
which the company said is business
aviation's "most affordable
broadband system."
Faster, more reliable
With all that going on, what
happens to throughput? Isn't Gogo
Biz's 3G "pipe" a little thin? Don't
cellphone users these days complain
when their device is receiving "only"

34

avionics news

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february

2016
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Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Avionics News February 2016
