Emirates | New Passenger Experience

UX + Storyboard + Illustration

Emirates is more than the world’s premier airline; it is one of the world’s premier luxury brands. At Artefact we proposed a new In-Flight Entertainment (IFE) customer experience for them with today’s accelerated changes in consumer behavior firmly in mind. We felt they could create lasting product leadership for ICE (their proprietary in-flight entertainment system) through a continued commitment to being different and being the best. We also wanted to raise the bar for the entire industry and deliver the world’s most entertaining, innovative, and radically simple IFE customer experience. 

We researched emerging trends in luxury and travel and based our designs on much of the data we found. For example, in 2015, 77% of the time people are using a TV, they are simultaneously using another device. This has huge implications for the IFE category, as it is moving from a passive entertainment experience, to becoming the centerpiece of a connected digital ecosystem. Since Emirates' ICE originally debuted, a new media landscape has emerged—coinciding with major changes in consumer behavior.

How we buy, how we watch, and how we communicate has all changed dramatically. We saw this as an enormous opportunity for Emirates,

as well as a danger sign that if they failed to act, they might be ripe for disruption.

We storyboarded an experience that would bring the Emirates brand to life through the creation of the most unique, innovative and luxurious digital experience in any category—not just aviation. We prioritized entertainment, and wanted to radically simplify the core ICE user experience. We also wanted to celebrate the global experience by supporting dual-byte languages and making ICE accessible to an audience with different abilities. 

We showed how they might smartly use connectivity to surprise and delight the passenger.

Further, we personalized the relationship with the passenger to make it easier for them to engage with the content and services they want, such as Netflix.

We also designed an IFE VR scenario and explored the different ways VR might be leveraged to make the flight both enjoyable and unique.

Using StoryboardVR, we created a UX flow demonstrating interesting concepts, including how external cameras might be accessed to put the passenger in the sky without the plane.