In addition to the 250 orders covered last issue (see “Turning Point,” Vertiflite, July/Aug 2021) from Halo Aviation and Helisul Aviation, Embraer’s Eve Urban Air Mobility Solutions unit has continued its announcements.
Elroy Air — the San Francisco, California-based aerospace and logistics startup developing an end-to-end autonomous eVTOL aerial cargo system — has completed a $40M Series A financing round from Marlinspike Capital, Lockheed Martin Ventures and Prosperity7 Ventures, alongside continued backing from existing investors, including Catapult Ventures, DiamondStream Partners, Side X Side Management, Shield Capital Partners and Precursor Ventures.
Craft Aerospace Technologies completed a $3.5M seed round with Calm Ventures, Countdown Capital, Deep Ventures, Giant Ventures, Soma Capital, Trajectory Capital and Y Combinator, as well as advisor Nikhil Goel, co-founder of Uber Elevate.
SAMAD Aerospace, headquartered at Cranfield Airport in the UK, completed hover tests for its second prototype eVTOL eStarling aircraft at the end of July.
Chinese electric vehicle manufacturer, XPeng Motors, unveiled what it calls its “fifth-generation flying vehicle,” the X2, on July 16, reported the Chinese electric vehicle news site, CnEVPost.com.
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.
In July, NASA announced that it had signed agreements with 13 companies and a university for the agency’s Advanced Air Mobility (AAM) National Campaign (NC).
Under the leadership of new CEO Nimrod Golan-Yanay, Yavne, Israel-based Urban Aeronautics has unveiled a stylish new makeover of its CityHawk eVTOL.
Skyworks Aeronautics Corp. announced in July that it had selected Newport News, Virginia-based Eagle Technologies, LLC, to design and fabricate the rotor system for the Skyworks’ eGyro electrically powered gyrodyne.
On June 29, Rotor X Aircraft Manufacturing Company unveiled a design for a six-seat, all-electric, quad-rotor helicopter called the eTransporter, which the company says is ideal for air taxi operations, package delivery, search and rescue, personnel recovery and medevac operations.
