SWISS is adopting a mould-breaking new seating concept for its intercontinental Business Class cabins. The new seats will be gradually installed throughout the SWISS long-haul fleet from spring 2009 onwards. The new seating will give SWISS Business travellers a "bed above the clouds" which is fully reclinable and two metres long. The lie-flat seats will also set new benchmarks with their air cushion feature, which allows seat hardness to be set for each seating position to meet individual wishes and needs. The new SWISS Business cabin should be installed aboard around a third of the carrier's long-haul fleet by the end of next year.
 
Work will begin next spring on installing the new SWISS Business Seat throughout the SWISS long-haul fleet. The new Airbus A330-300s which will join the fleet from 2009 onwards will all feature the new seats. In addition to the innovative new seating concept, their entire interior will be consistently aligned to customer needs. The Airbus A340s, the biggest aircraft in the SWISS fleet, will also be equipped with the new SWISS Business Seat. Under the current schedule, around one-third of the SWISS long-haul fleet should be fitted with the new SWISS Business cabin in 2009. A large proportion of the fleet will be refurbished in 2010; and all SWISS Business customers should be enjoying a truly excellent inflight seating and sleeping experience on all SWISS long-haul flights by 2011.    
 
"We are extremely proud to have helped develop this global seating innovation, together with several hundred of our customers," says SWISS CEO Christoph Franz. "And we are particularly delighted to be the first airline in the world to offer these substantially-enhanced levels of on-board seating and sleeping comfort."
 
"Our new SWISS Business Seat is a further consistent step in our ongoing quality drive that has been under way for more than three years now," adds SWISS Chief Marketing & Strategy Officer Christoph Beckmann. "SWISS continues to invest in adding value for its customers. And the rightness of our strategy is fully confirmed by our business results: we have seen above-average growth in the use of our Business and First Class since our quality drive began; and this has further strengthened our position and our profile as a genuine quality airline."
 
Swiss innovation for SWISS

The innovative new interior concept has been developed under SWISS's overall charge in collaboration with numerous specialist companies in and outside Switzerland. The new seats' adjustable air cushion has been developed by Lantal, a medium-sized Swiss-based company in the design, manufacture and distribution of textiles for transport applications, with a particular focus on the international airline community.
 
"Our collaboration with Switzerland's national airline underlines both our high quality standards and our leading market position," says Urs Rickenbacher, CEO of Lantal. "We are very proud that SWISS will be the first airline to offer this landmark innovation to its customers. And the development of our pneumatic seat cushion is a tribute to Swiss innovation and to our unique locational advantages."