• 11 Sep 2021 02:43 PM
• 0

Whisper Aero Silently Comes out of Stealth

As Uber Elevate was transitioning to Joby last year (see “Joby Transitions,” Vertiflite, Jan/Feb 2021), Elevate co-founder Mark Moore founded startup Whisper Aero, along with Ian Villa (Elevate’s head of strategy and system simulation) as chief operating officer (COO) and chief product officer (CPO) and Jacek Kawecki (Elevate’s vehicle components lead) as mechanical design lead. The 30-year NASA veteran bought a former resort in Crossville, Tennessee, and set it up as the company’s secluded development complex. According to the July 12 reveal in Bloomberg, “Moore is convinced that Whisper has hit on a new ‘thruster’ design that will result in consumer drones right on up to large passenger vehicles blending into the background noise of a city as they fly.” The company announced that it had raised $7.5M, including from “Iron Man” actor Robert Downey, Jr.’s FootPrint Coalition Ventures. “Creating unchecked noise pollution for the sake of electric aviation’s vital future is a problem,” Downey said in a statement.