Ferrari seats, headphones by Beats and BeOnd: Inside the Maldives all business class airline

06.08.2024 - 02:53 / euronews.com / Tero Taskila

Offering business class flights at a fraction of the cost, this airline says it’s creating a new niche in luxury travel.

Registered in the Maldives and headquartered in Dubai, BeOnd took its inaugural flight from Munich to Malé in November last year. Eight months on, it has just launched a new route from Malé to Milan, adding to its existing Dubai, Riyadh and Zurich routes. 

Tero Taskila, the CEO of BeOnd, is an industry veteran with a career in aviation spanning 30 years in companies across the world. Taskila believed it was the right time to launch a boutique, all business-class airline after seeing the industry reach a crossroad. 

“Now we are in a perfect moment in aviation history where the technology is meeting the demand, and we have an opportunity to create something niche for that particular segment and be very focused on that segment,” he says. 

In September, BeOnd will launch its first Asia Pacific destination: Bangkok in Thailand. The route will open a gateway to a major market many airlines are racing to capture.

Opting for narrow-body Airbus A319s, BeOnd places only 44 seats in a plane that can carry up to 156 passengers if it were an all-economy offering. 

The airline will soon expand its fleet to include the Airbus A321, which will have 68 business class seats, still roomy for a plane that can carry 220 passengers. 

BeOnd’s lie-flat seats are designed by Optimares, with seat shells by Ferrari and fine leather fittings from Italy. A team of world-class chefs prepare curated on-board menus, inspired by flavours of the different destinations.

But beyond the fine dining and sleek interiors, Taskila says most of the positive feedback he has received has been about the crew.

“Our crew is our biggest loyalty tribe. People love our crew. I recently got the biggest compliment from a client, who said he was extremely impressed by a cabin crew, who knew so much and was very attentive, and who was on his first day on the job,” he says.

Although BeOnd brands itself as a luxury airline, Taskila says he doesn’t mind it being seen as a ‘value for money’ carrier.

“We don't need to be outrageously expensive. But we need to be able to, at whatever price we are offering, exceed that value, so we are creating the value,” he says.

So, how much does it actually cost to fly on BeOnd?

At the time of writing, a return flight from Munich to Malé in October is selling for around US$2,800 or €2,600.

The same route with Lufthansa costs upwards of €4,500, with at least one stopover.

BeOnd features VR Apple headsets and Beats headphones

BeOnd has also opted to do away with the standard embedded screens for its in-flight entertainment system. Instead, the company has chosen to offer the latest Apple iPad Pro tablets and Beats by Dre