Thompson lives in the small coastal town of Kilkeel in County Down.
In February 2008, Delta Air Lines announced that they would be installing the Vantage sleeper suite product designed by Thompson on their Boeing 767-400ER aircraft, engineered and manufactured by Contour Premium Aircraft Seating[3] in a multi-million pound deal with Thompson Aero Seating.
More recently Thompson Aero Seating secured deals for the Vantage seat with some of the world's largest airlines on various aircraft types, including Qantas (Airbus A330), American Airlines (Boeing 767-300), Air Canada (Boeing 777) and Etihad Airways.
Development Test and after having conducted a number of customer comfort trials, Cozy Suite has been ready to enter service in 2011 although no airlines have purchased the seat to date leading to the company ceasing development of the seat type.
[4] The Cozy Suite economy seat offers a distinct horizontally stepped seating layout which eases egress, provides a shoulder width as wide as business class, a dedicated sleeping area and more legroom.