Europe’s Lufthansa Airlines Launches NFT Loyalty Program
Lufthansa Group, the second largest airline fleet in Europe, simply introduced its NFT-infused loyalty program. It can enable passengers to scan their boarding go within the Uptrip cellular app and change it for NFT buying and selling playing cards to unlock airline miles, enterprise vouchers, and different journey rewards.
Powered by Polygon’s proof-of-stake (PoS) blockchain protocol, the brand new program is the brainchild of Lufthansa’s digital innovation unit, Lufthansa Innovation Hub, and its frequent flyer program, Miles & Extra.
Since its delicate launch in spring 2023, Uptrip has skilled 20,000+ registered customers with over 200,000 NFT buying and selling playing cards issued.
In keeping with the August 31 announcement, Uptrip is now making ready to maneuver into its second part – the launch of a market, which is predicted to be launched later this 12 months. The app is at present out there to obtain from Apple’s App Retailer and the Google Play Retailer.
Is that this a sustainable mechanism?
Kristian Weymar, who heads up new enterprise at Lufthansa Innovation Hub, believes that Uptrip “hits a nerve” in the case of these new Web3-infused applied sciences.
“[Its] in an early stage of growth,” he mentioned, noting that whereas “curiosity is excessive,” the European airline large is also dealing with questions and hesitations in regards to the know-how.
“We make it doable for individuals to entry this new know-how,” he added.
Christopher Siegloch, Head of Program Improvement at Miles & Extra, mentioned that Uptrip’s gamification components introduce passengers to those applied sciences – particularly NFTs, in a “enjoyable method.” He teased that they’re at present testing a brand new function within the Miles & Extra ecosystem.
However does this mechanism even have long-term viability?
The most important problem we proceed to see throughout these “new and revolutionary” purposes of NFT applied sciences is knowing the “why” behind these integrations. With the first goal of onboarding as many customers into this subsequent wave of interactive on-line experiences, many main manufacturers have missed the mark in enhancing an already established ecosystem by asking customers/customers to “do one thing new” that requires further work and understanding as to what these applied sciences are.
In brief, customers proper now don’t want to fret in regards to the underlying know-how that’s powering their experiences – all they care about is familiarity and whether or not or not the services or products does what they want it to do. Generally, they don’t care about the way it works.
This 12 months proved to be a tough 12 months for Europe’s main airways. Nonetheless, the German-based airline group ranks second below Ryanair, which carried essentially the most vacationers in Europe in 2021 at 72.4 million compared to Lufthansa at 46.9 million.
Etihad Airways and “Horizon Membership”
Earlier this month, United Arab Emirates’ flagship airline service, Etihad Airways, additionally introduced its enlargement of its loyalty and rewards applications by teasing a brand new 300-edition enlargement to its Polygon-based EY-ZERO1 NFT assortment. This enables vacationers the flexibility to “stake” or lock their digital property in change for airline miles.
Dubbed “Horizon Membership,” the brand new loyalty program will debut in September, introducing its “staking-for-miles” function that can enable vacationers to “lock” their NFTs and earn Etihad Visitor Miles in return, which might subsequently be redeemed for flights, seat upgrades, and different unique advantages.
NFL Rivals
One other good instance we’ve seen to this point was this month’s launch of “NFL Rivals,” the first-ever licensed recreation from the NFL, the NFL Gamers Affiliation (NFLPA), and Legendary Video games. Whereas the sport does incorporate Web3 know-how, it’s not noticeable to gamers and doesn’t burden them with having to know or interact with the complexities of blockchain know-how.
Editor’s notice: This text was written by an nft now employees member in collaboration with OpenAI’s GPT-4.
