Lufthansa Innovation Hub and Lufthansa Technik released a report on Feb. 3 entitled, “Are air taxis ready for prime time?” According to the company, the engaging report “provides a data-driven view into the state of the air taxi ecosystem including a patent analysis ranking eVTOL technology leaders.”
On Jan. 27, Munich, Germany-based Lilium announced that it had signed a framework agreement to develop a network of at least 10 vertiports with Ferrovial, a global leading infrastructure operator based in Madrid, Spain. The zero-carbon infrastructure and services “will cover strategic locations in all major cities across Florida.”
At the VFS eVTOL Symposium in January, San Francisco, California-based Airflow announced that it was beginning development of “one of the first full-scale piloted technology demonstrators of an eSTOL aircraft.” For the last year, Airflow has been utilizing a sub-scale model for test flights that have helped develop its eSTOL flight control technology.
Astro Aerospace of Dallas, Texas, has been developing manned and unmanned derivatives of its Astro design based on the PassengerDrone (shown) — one of the first eVTOL demonstrators, with first manned flights in 2017 (see “Astro's Elroy Blasts Off,” Vertiflite, Nov/Dec 2018).
In the 8th Annual Electric VTOL Symposium held by VFS in January, Detroit, Michigan-based Airspace Experience Technologies (ASX) announced its latest electric tilt-wing configuration, Sigma Six.
Massachusetts-based Terrafugia, Inc., announced on Jan. 26 that it had obtained FAA Special Light-Sport Aircraft (LSA) airworthiness certificate for its Transition roadable aircraft (with automobile certification to follow in 2022).
The UK government’s Future Flight Challenge announced in January that it had selected the company Urban Air Port, partnered with Hyundai Motor Group and the Coventry City Council, to develop the Air-One skyport hub to evaluate eVTOL aircraft operations.
In order to facilitate a UAM ecosystem around the Paris region, the RATP Group, Groupe ADP and Choose Paris Region launched an international call for interest on Oct. 1. Some 150 applications from 25 countries were received and 30 winners were selected, with the intent to begin conducting experiments in June 2021 in the test area at the Pontoise-Cormeilles-en-Vexin airfield, which was inaugurated on Sept. 30.
The Single European Sky (SES) Air Traffic Management (ATM) Research Joint Undertaking (SESAR-JU) announced on Jan. 21 that it had formed a consortium 17 companies and other organizations to design and test concepts of operations for various AAM (aka urban air mobility, UAM) applications within the framework of U-space — the European Commission’s Unmanned Traffic Management (UTM) System that seeks safe and secure integration of drones and other autonomous aircraft into Europe’s airspace.
Bruchsal, Germany-based Volocopter GmbH announced on Jan. 15 that the FAA had “positively accepted” its application for concurrent type certificate validation on Dec. 22, setting the basis for Volocopter to bring its VoloCity electric air taxi services to the American market.
