News

Hyundai UAM Hires Drennan, Cooper, Whitaker

• 30 Apr 2020 02:41 PM
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In March, J. Scott Drennan (shown) updated his LinkedIn profile to note that he was now the chief research and development officer at Hyundai Motor Group’s Urban Air Mobility (UAM) division, after 26 years at Bell. Most of Drennan’s career was as a structural analyst, but included three years in management roles on the joint Bell-Leonardo AW609 program (2011–2014), followed by leadership roles in air vehicle integration and innovation.

GoFly Inspires Innovation

• 29 Apr 2020 05:33 PM
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Twenty-one teams from 10 countries were invited to participate in the GoFly Prize Final Fly Off competition on Feb. 28–29, many to showcase their “personal flyers” and several to compete for a $1M Grand Prize. The event was held at Moffett Federal Airfield at NASA Ames Research Center in Mountain View, California, in the heart of the Silicon Valley.

VFS Agility Prime support

• 29 Apr 2020 09:10 AM
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On April 27–May 1, the US Air Force held a week-long virtual launch event for its Agility Prime initiative. Dr. Will Roper, Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for Acquisition, Technology & Logistics, launched the program to accelerate the growth of the transformative vertical flight market for subsequent government use.

NASA’s National Campaign

• 27 Apr 2020 08:10 PM
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In 2015, NASA began a four-year project to provide guidance for low-altitude (under 500 ft/150 m) air traffic management for unmanned aircraft systems (UAS). This UAS Traffic Management (UTM) project set out to define all aspects of lowaltitude traffic management including airspace management and geo-fencing, weather and wind, predict and manage congestion, terrain and man-made objects and safe separation. The program provided problem sets with increasing complexity, from unpopulated land (UTM-1) to autonomous, beyond visual line-ofsight, urban operations (UTM-4).

VFS Supports UAM Symposium at Ohio State

• 27 Apr 2020 08:35 AM
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On Feb. 27, experts from around the country descended on Columbus, Ohio, for the Inaugural Urban Air Mobility (UAM) Symposium at The Ohio State University. With some 200 attendees representing academia, government and industry, the event was a major success and looks to be a catalyst for the future of aerial mobility in the state of Ohio. George Valcarcel, of the OSU Battelle Center for Science, Engineering and Public Policy, was symposium’s lead organizer and master of ceremonies.

The Electric VTOL Revolution webinar

• 14 Apr 2020 10:29 AM
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VFS Executive Director Mike Hirschberg presented a webinar, "The Electric VTOL Revolution," for the American Composites Manufacturers Association (ACMA) on April 14, 2020. See the ACMA webinar notice.

Skydrive Conducts Manned Flights, Moves Forward With Nobuo Kishi At The Helm

• 04 Apr 2020 08:32 PM
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SkyDrive Press Release, April 4, 2020:

Skydrive Conducts Manned Flights, Moves Forward With Nobuo Kishi At The Helm

• Japan’s first-ever manned test flights of a flying car^*1 completed by SkyDrive
• Nobuo Kishi appointed as Chief Technology Officer
• Kishi will lead the development and certification to take the product to market in 2023

Lilium Completes $240M Funding Round

• 25 Mar 2020 10:24 AM
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Munich-based Lilium GmbH announced on March 23, 2020 that is had completed an internal funding round worth more than $240M. The round was led by Tencent, with participation from other existing investors including Atomico, Freigeist and LGT.

The new funds bring the total sum raised to date to more than $340M. The company said the additional funds will be used to support further development of the Lilium Jet as well as underpinning preparations for serial production in Lilium's newly-completed manufacturing facilities.

Advanced Vertical Flight Technical Committee Highlights

• 09 Mar 2020 08:46 PM
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We have restarted our regular series highlighting the activities of our 22 technical committees. Interested in joining or finding out more? Go to www.vtol.org/tech-committees.

The 2020 International Powered Lift Conference (IPLC) was held in January as part of the Transformative Vertical Flight 2020 Conference. This biennial conference rotates between the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA), the Royal Aeronautical Society, SAE International and VFS.

Urban Air Mobility Steals the Show at CES 2020

• 07 Mar 2020 09:23 PM
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There were plenty of noteworthy announcements about electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) aircraft developments leading up to the 2020 Consumer Electronics Show (CES), the world’s largest consumer products trade show, held Jan. 7-10 in Las Vegas, Nevada (see for example, “The First Electric VTOL Unicorn: Joby Aviation,” Vertiflite Magazine, Mar/Apr 2020, pg. 48).