A New Business Class Seat for Air France
 
Air France unveiled it’s long awaited new Business class seat this morning. The angled-flat “NEV” (meaning Nouveaux Espaces Voyages) seats that have been in place for about a decade will become a thing of the past. It’s now all about the 3 Fs: Full Flat, Full aisle-access, Full Privacy. No more sliding down your seat on those redeye flights, the new seats are perfectly 180 degrees horizontal in bed mode. The seats are 196 cm (87 in) long in bed mode and 68 cm (27 in) wide and will be arranged in a “reverse herringbone” pattern, meaning that the window seats will be angled towards the window as opposed to towards the aisle in a traditional herringbone pattern, giving even more privacy.
 
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The current 2-3-2 configuration on Air France Boeing 777 aircraft will become a much roomier 1-2-1 arrangement. The Air France Business class passenger will experience much sought-after privacy on long flights as walls separate these seats. The seats also feature padding behind the adjustable soft-leather headrest, as well as several storage areas built into the seat structure.
 
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This is a truly revolutionary change for Air France as the Business class cabin on 777-300 aircraft will go from 67 seats to only 58; 777-200 cabins will go from 49 to 40 seats. A less crowded cabin with more personal space for every passenger.
 
Air France will also be introducing a new quilted cover in Business, along with an oversized feather pillow.
 
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There are also improvements on the technological side as the seats will feature larger 16” Hi-definition touchscreen monitors with touchscreen remote controls, individual power ports, USD ports, and newer noise-cancelling headphones. The new screens should offer an experience akin to that of a personal tablet. The IFE (In-flight Entertainment) system will be available in 12 languages (French, English, Spanish, Portuguese, Chinese, Korean, Japanese, German, Italian, Dutch, Russian, and Arabic). Finding entertainment among the over 1000 hours of programming on offer has never been so easy.
 
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This is a hefty investment for Air France, but the French airline is determined to have a product on par with the popular Asian and Gulf carriers. More than 2000 seats will be installed at a cost of over 200 million Euros over a period of two years starting in June 2014. More than 40 777s will be equipped with the new cabin—18 777s dedicated to leisure routes and French overseas territories will retain the current product offering. The superjumbo A380 fleet, the current Flagship of the airline, will also be receiving a revamp, though Air France has yet to release details.
 
Especially conceived for Air France, this “Cirrus” Business class seat was developed in collaboration with the French company Zodiac Aerospace, a world leader in aircraft seat manufacturing. Many elements went into designing the seat which Air France hopes will be among the most comfortable in the sky.
 
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For avid readers of Flight-Report.com, you’ve most likely seen similar seats in previous reports. This cabin will be similar to that of Cathay Pacific and the new American Airlines 777-300ER cabin.
 
To discover or rediscover this type of cabin, we suggest these reports by Flight-Report members Pititom and Adrianfong:
 
flight-report.com/en/report-4796.html


 
Which member of Flight-Report.com will be the first to test the new Air France seats and publish a report? Stay tuned!
 
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