On May 21, electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) aircraft startup Archer unveiled its plans and progress to the world. The company is led by co-founders Brett Adcock and Adam Goldstein, serial entrepreneurs who recently sold hiring marketplace startup Vettery to The Adecco Group for over $100M.
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Aviation industry and finance experts say the global economic recession caused by the COVID-19 pandemic will prove deadly for many developers of electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) aircraft and may lead big corporate investors to slow their eVTOL ventures. But the recession will likely just speed the arrival of the inevitable.
With the dawn of a new decade, we’ve been taking a look back at how things have changed since the beginning of the 21st Century. Like everything else, this series has now taken a new perspective given the impact of the COVID-19 global pandemic.
A long-time VTOL designer’s latest startup emerging from stealth development mode has unveiled a hybrid-electric “practical flying car” concept that it hopes to ground- and hover-test next year, culminating nearly 20 years of development including a government contract.
Slovenian electric aircraft manufacturer Pipistrel announced plans in a May 13 newsletter to shift developmental focus from its Project-801 eVTOL — a candidate for the Uber Air mission — towards three of its other designs following “delays with the Uber flying taxi program by many international authorities.”
German eVTOL aircraft maker Volocopter has recently partnered with two companies as part of developing its two-seat VoloCity multicopter. Aerospace equipment manufacturer AUTOFLUG GmbH announced May 7 it would supply Volocopter with its modular Flyweight family of seats for installation on the VoloCity. Under the contract, AUTOFLUG will produce and deliver the seats, and the two companies will jointly develop the interface “to make optimum use of the available space in the cabin.”
Airbus intends to continue developing its CityAirbus eVTOL program in spite of the COVID-19 pandemic, the manufacturer told eVTOL.com on May 5. The CityAirbus multicopter began free-flight testing at the end of 2019 with the goal of informing future eVTOL designs in a similar way as the company’s Silicon Valley eVTOL demonstrator, the A³ Vahana tiltwing.
NASA Langley Research Center on April 24 premiered a video describing its Langley Aerodrome 8 (LA-8) modular unmanned aerial vehicle, a testbed the agency called a “flying laboratory for urban air mobility.” NASA is using the LA-8 to investigate different eVTOL technologies and configurations in the hopes of aiding the private sector in establishing the UAM market.
The Utah Advanced Materials and Manufacturing Initiative (UAMMI), a multi-disciplinary association working to strengthen the state’s manufacturing and technical capabilities, announced April 14 it had partnered with Salt Lake City, Utah-based personal flying vehicle developer ElectraFly to create 3D-printed carbon fiber aircraft parts for its hybrid-electric VTOL aircraft.
Electric propulsion system designer MagniX and engineering, testing and certification firm AeroTEC conducted the first flight of an all-electric conventional takeoff and landing (eCTOL) modification to a Cessna Caravan 208B plane on May 28. AeroTEC called the 11-seat eCaravan (shown) the largest commercial electric aircraft to date.
