Earlier today, Malaysia Airlines unveiled their latest premium offering – the new Business Class seats on their A330 fleet. For those who often travels in Business, this is great news as the new seats is a timely refresh up-front to remain competitive with premium offerings from other airlines. With the airlines recently completed the phasing out of Boeing 777, the A330 is now the main fleet for medium to long haul flights hence it is good to hear that passengers would not need to settle for second best. To be fair the previous A330 Business Class seats were not too bad. Biggest complaint was mainly on its angled lie flat seats (instead of full-flat) which I had the opportunity to try previously here and here.

I was invited to the Malaysia Airlines Launch of A330 New Business Class event but was not able to attend. Hence I would not be able to provide my own review on the new seats. I will however share some awesome photos captured by fellow aviation enthusiast, En. M Sofian who was invited as one of the airlines loyal customer, being an Enrich Platinum member.

Thanks Sofian for sharing these photos.

Event held at Malaysia Airlines hangar in KLIA. No, there was no sighting of any 747 in retro colours reported :p

The launch performances and gimmicks including performance by Syafinas Kamal.

Hello new business class seats!

Nice hair by the way.

The refurbishment/retrofitting of the A330s are being done in stages so chances in getting these new seats will depend on routes you’re flying to. For a start, those who are flying to Sydney will get the chance to try it out first, so hurry upgrade you tickets if you’re flying to Sydney on MH.

For a start, if you’re flying on 9M-MTL, you surely can experience the new seats.

The new seats. The configuration is now 1-2-1 and 1-2-2 vs previously 7 rows of 2-2-2. Less passengers in business with this new setup but definitely more space.

More privacy and a bit more modern-looking seats.

More space and better access to control functions. The buttons to adjust the seat is now much easier to access and I like the storage space which is nice to store laptops and phones.

What I also love is the availability of single seats on one of the rows which is perfect for business travellers who need some privacy.

The personal screen also looks bigger based on the photos. I will try to confirm on this.

Malaysia Airlines is also introducing for the first time, premium economy “Economy +”seats. 2 rows of economy seats with better legroom in between the business class and economy.

At the time of writing, I can see that the only advantage of premium economy “Economy +”is the extra legroom and an impression of being in a private cabin with only 2 rows. I reckon more benefits will be added to it such as priority during inflight meals, priority boarding, additional luggage allowance?

The new business class, followed by the new Economy+ and the economy class.

Having seen these photos, the new business seats looks fresh and premium economy seats I think is a good concept especially with many companies opting for cost cuttings which could see more executives opting for “somewhere in between business and economy”.

Looks like I got to start scouting for cheap business class tickets once again to try it out myself. Most of the time however, you can still find me here….

Good ol economy class 🙂

Once again, thank you En Sofian for allowing us to use your photos!

Seen here, the 2 aviation enthusiasts who covered the event. 🙂