# Beond: The new business-class only airline flying from London Heathrow to the Maldives from December 2026 Page: https://stenobird.com/podcast/simon-calder-s-independent-travel-podcast-3759397/beond-the-new-business-class-only-airline-flying-from-london-heathrow-to-the-maldives-from-december-2026 Text version: https://stenobird.com/podcast/simon-calder-s-independent-travel-podcast-3759397/beond-the-new-business-class-only-airline-flying-from-london-heathrow-to-the-maldives-from-december-2026.md Podcast: [Simon Calder's Independent Travel Podcast](https://stenobird.com/podcast/simon-calder-s-independent-travel-podcast-3759397) Published: 2026-04-09T02:00:00+00:00 Episode link: https://www.independent.co.uk/newsletters Audio file: https://sphinx.acast.com/p/acast/s/green-list-travel-with-simon-calder-and-the-independent/e/69d693cdef4d724206051176/media.mp3 Processing state: not_requested JSON: https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/simon-calder-s-independent-travel-podcast-3759397/episodes/beond-the-new-business-class-only-airline-flying-from-london-heathrow-to-the-maldives-from-december-2026 Duration seconds: 541 ## Resource Could you be tempted by the prospect of an exclusive 44-seat aircraft? All-business-class carrier Beond is set to take passengers in some luxury to the Indian Ocean. Rhys Jones, aviation editor for Head for Points, has sampled the cabin. We also talk about Relax Row, the clever three-seat flat bed in economy that Air New Zealand conceived and United Airlines has now picked up. And will there ever be a proper flat bed experience in economy or premium economy? This podcast is free, as is Independent Travel's weekly newsletter. Sign up here to get it delivered to your inbox. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. ## Actions - request_transcript: `POST https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/simon-calder-s-independent-travel-podcast-3759397/episodes/beond-the-new-business-class-only-airline-flying-from-london-heathrow-to-the-maldives-from-december-2026/transcription-requests` — Idempotently request low-priority transcript generation for this episode. - read_markdown: `GET https://stenobird.com/podcast/simon-calder-s-independent-travel-podcast-3759397/beond-the-new-business-class-only-airline-flying-from-london-heathrow-to-the-maldives-from-december-2026.md` — Read the agent-friendly Markdown representation of this episode resource. A page view does not enqueue transcription. Agents should invoke `request_transcript` explicitly when they need this episode processed. ## Transcript Full transcripts are not published on public pages unless there is a clear rights basis.