Google Glass is now heading to the aviation industry after being introduced in medical and educational fields as Virgin Atlantic has announced a six week trial program in which it will be testing whether the wearable gadget can help in improving customer service.
As part of the pilot program, only upper class passengers flying from London Heathrow airport will be greeted by the airline’s employees wearing Google Glass or a Sony SmartWatch 2.
Using wearable technology, the airline staff will be able to update their passengers with the latest flight information, about the weather and local events at their destinations and also translate any foreign language information.
Director of IT, Virgin Atlantic, Dave Bulman, said “While it’s fantastic that more people can now fly than ever before, the fact that air travel has become so accessible has led to some of the sheen being lost for many passengers.”
The six-week project is being carried in collaboration with SITA – the information technology company specialising in the air transport industry. If all goes well, the airline could roll out the technology to other airports as well.
The airline is also testing iBeacon technology with its upper class passengers at Heathrow, which is a new low-powered Bluetooth transmitter that can notify nearby iOS Apple devices of nearby services, discounts and updates on their flight boarding schedules.
It seems that through the new initiative, Virgin wants to bring back glamour to air travel. Citing a recent study, the airline said that 42 percent of those surveyed said that flying had become less glamorous than it used to be earlier.
