We’ve all been there, crammed into a middle seat on a cross-country flight with little hope for comfort.
You've probably lost battles for the armrests and the person seated in the aisle or window is audibly snoring. You’re trapped in a middle seat wasteland.
One Colorado startup is looking to change the middle seat experience and recently received FAA clearance to do so.
“It sucks,” said Hank Scott, succinctly describing the current state of middle seats.
About seven years ago, Scott, a former pilot in the Royal Australian Navy, began working on an innovative solution to a decades-old problem.
Scott and the Lakewood-based Molon Labe Seating team initially developed the side slip seat, a staggered seat design that allows the aisle seat to slide over the top of the middle seat during boarding to create increased aisle room.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NU9W__Ux3lU
While the side slip was Molon Labe’s first product, the company is moving forward with its S1 space seat model after receiving FAA certification in June.
The staggered design remains, giving middle seat passengers an extra five inches of room as compared to their aisle and window seat counterparts, without stealing space from them. Molon Labe’s seat design permits the seat frames to mount on top of each other.
The staggered seating also creates what Scott hopes is elbow room harmony, giving all passengers a dedicated spot on the arm rest.
Each seat is equipped with a smartphone and tablet holder, USB port and latchless table.
The company already has one major, unnamed, customer on the books and is in talks with two additional airlines to purchase their seats. Scott said they’re made to integrate with any airline, offering customization in spacing between rows and color.
Following the FAA approval, the six-person company is targeting a full rollout in April 2020. Scott said they’re also weighing a Series A round to help accelerate further growth and product development.
When looking at the industry as a whole, Scott said it’s an interesting time for companies looking to change how we fly. As airline companies realize that they can’t add any more seats to planes, creative thinking becomes increasingly important.
“The industry is so terrified of innovation, they throw the word around, but nobody acts on it,” he said. “This is a risk averse industry, so we tried to make a fairly small innovation.”
