Emirates has picked up ‘Best Airline in the World’ and ‘Best First Class’ at the prestigious 2019 ULTRAs. Voted by the hundreds of thousands of readers of The Telegraph’s luxury travel magazines Ultratravel UK and Ultratravel Middle East, the awards are the industry hallmark of the world’s best luxury travel experiences.
Adel Al Redha, Chief Operating Officer for Emirates Airline, received the awards at a ceremony held last night in Dubai at the Emerald Palace Kempinski Hotel. The ceremony was attended by key members in the global travel industry. The two awards are a recognition of the airline’s consistent delivery of trendsetting travel products and services across its fleet and network.
Adel Al Redha commented on the multiple accolades, “Emirates is honoured to be recognised for the hard work and commitment we put in to make flying better for our customers. Tonight’s awards demonstrate that our efforts have made a positive contribution our customers’ journey, and we will continue to innovate our products and services across all of our touch points on the ground and onboard to make travel experience personalised, enjoyable, comfortable and efficient. I would like to take this opportunity to thank all of our team members for their contributions and work to bring our brand promise to life and help to win the loyalty of our customers.”
In 2019, Emirates continued to place customers at the heart of its business and intensified its investments in products and services, reinforcing its quality proposition. In April 2019, Emirates completed its US $150 million refurbishment of 10 Boeing 777-200LR aircraft, offering a two-class cabin with wider Business Class seats in a 2-2-2 format and a fully refreshed Economy Class cabin in new colourscapes and enhanced designs.
The airline boosted its in-flight entertainment selection, and now provides customers with an unmatched selection of 4,500 channels of on demand entertainment. In 2019, Emirates also introduced playlist synching, a way for customers to browse the extensive content on offer, create personalised playlists based on their preferences ahead of their flight, and sync it to their seats once on board, using the Emirates App. Throughout 2020, the airline plans to expand playlist synching progressively across its entire fleet due to popular demand.
In First Class, Emirates ‘game-changer’ Boeing 777-300ER, introduced in 2017, continues to amaze customers with its sleek, modern interiors and futuristic technologies. Featuring six fully enclosed First-Class Private Suites, the cabin is inspired by the design and signature details of the Mercedes-Benz S-Class. Arranged in a 1-1-1 configuration, each suite provides 40 square feet of personal space, cutting-edge climate control and lighting technologies, a NASA inspired ‘zero-gravity’ seating position, industry-first ‘virtual windows’ for middle aisle suites, and a personal video-call service for ultimate privacy. The newest Boeing 777-300ER ‘game-changer’ aircraft currently flies to nine global cities.
On the ground, Emirates has been consistently working to find ways to provide its customers with seamless experiences and last year launched its first remote check-in terminal outside of Dubai International Airport, enabling an efficient check-in process for cruise passengers and easy stopover visits to its home city. The airline also launched biometric boarding and facial recognition technology at its departure gates for customers flying from Dubai to any of its 12 destinations in the U.S., reducing the time taken for identity checks. More biometric technology is being rolled out for a better end-to-end experience in 2020.