June 30 2022  |  Seating

Safran seats to fly on Air New Zealand

By Rick Lundstrom

Passengers rest far from the aisles on Business Premier seats from Safran Seats

This week, Air New Zealand unveiled a new cabin interior featuring its latest Business Premier seats, designed and manufactured with Safran Seats.

They are due to enter in service in 2024 and retrofit the airline's current 787-9 fleet.

Air New Zealand selected a concept to create a ‘home away from home’ experience. The seat is specifically designed for 787 aircraft maximizing the available space in the aircraft type. The Business Premier seat offers a comfortable and private area for sleep. If traveling with a companion, the middle row allows passengers to share their flight and dining experience.

The herringbone configuration of the cabin creates an equal experience for all passengers and ensures a better sleep with the head of passengers being far from the aisle. A private environment for the passenger with high shells combined with adjustable aisle and center dividers helps for a restful flight. Passengers have stowage areas that are certified for Taxi, Take-off and Landing (TTL) as well as multiple surfaces including an electrically assisted large single-piece meal table. The Air New Zealand suite has wireless charging and with an active backrest offering the passenger another way to manage their personal comfort, certified for variable TTL positions.


The Business Premier seat was designed specifically for the 787

This premium front row is offered across multiple Safran products in which the layout replaces the traditional front row monuments to provide the utmost privacy and space to the passenger whilst maintaining the same footprint. This also provides new and enhanced experiences such as welcoming another passenger into a suite. For Air New Zealand, this increases the useable space for the passenger by 25 percent.

“We really encouraged Safran to think differently and push the boundaries with what we can do with the Business Premier seat to optimize the configuration and customer experience,” said Air New Zealand Head of Aircraft Programs Kerry Reeves in today’s announcement. “Working virtually throughout Covid added another layer of complexity. Without being able to travel to the Safran site to validate our ideas and concepts, we paralleled the mock-up build both in New Zealand at our innovation lab and at Safran to ensure we had a common design interpretation and valid feedback on the engineering development of the layout and features.”

Vincent Mascré, CEO of Safran Seats, added: "We are pleased to provide Air New Zealand with a product that meets their needs to offer choice and a product dedicated to ultra-long-haul flight. These seats are the fruit of incredible work between our companies, and it will allow a better journey for all their passengers. The creation of this seat displays the remarkable capabilities between Air New Zealand and the experienced Safran Seats teams based in United Kingdom".

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