Earlier this year, Amadeus commissioned Travel Tech Consulting to conduct research on airlines mobile trends. The whitepaper “The Always-Connected Traveller: How Mobile Will Transform the Future of Air Travel” combines research from JD Power with interviews of nine airlines from around the world. Augmented with Travel Tech’s ongoing monitoring of mobile airline trends, the report provides a clear picture of the current state of airline mobile technology and what we can expect in the 1-2 year and 3-5 year time frame.

Most airlines have done the basics which include mobile check-in, 2D bar code boarding passes and itinerary management. Many airlines have mobile booking capability today and most will be adding it over the next 12 months. In developing markets such as Africa and India where the primary connection to the Internet is the mobile device, the entire travel booking process may take place on the mobile phone. Over the next two years airlines will be adding key functionality to their mobile offering to expand merchandising opportunities. Key among these efforts is the ability to book ancillary services on mobile devices. Ancillary services are an important revenue source for airlines, but also provide a way to allow the passenger to customise their travel experience.

Advanced airline mobile innovations we can expect in the 3-5 year time frame  fall into two  major categories(1) Functions related to the passenger experience and (2) Capabilities that take advantage of advanced mobile device or software features.   Passenger experience related functions include:

• Location based services – These are services that provide location sensitive advertisements promoting airport or local merchants as well as local information guides (e.g. airport, gates, baggage carousels, etc…)
• Advanced disruption management – This includes the pushing of alternate flights and the offer of personalised compensation and electronic vouchers for hotels when a flight is cancelled.
• Social media – Monitoring social media comments  and targeting the passenger’s physical location to  prioritise  assistance based on the nature of the issue. Also being considered is the integration of peer reviews during the mobile ticket purchasing process.
• Movement tracking – Depending on local cultural and legal restrictions, automatically identifying a passenger’s location in the airport.
• Advanced push notifications – This has two main purposes, providing the passenger with more information about their flight or baggage and selling ancillary services to monetise the mobile channel