Flying taxis are on the horizon as aviation soars into a new frontier

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SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — When he was still a boy making long, boring trips between his school and his wooded home in the mountains during the 1980s, Joben Beffert began to imagine flying cars that could take him to his destination in a matter of minutes. .

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As CEO of Joby Aviation, Beavert is one step closer to turning his childhood luxury flights into a dream come true as he and modern versions of the Wright brothers launch a new class of electric-powered aircraft vying to become sky taxis.

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The plane — known as an electric vertical take-off and landing vehicle, or eVTOL — rises off the ground like a helicopter before flying at speeds of up to 200 mph (322 kilometers per hour) with a range of about 100 miles (161 kilometers). This craft does this without filling the air with excessive noise caused by helicopters and small fuel-powered aircraft.

“We are just a few steps away from the finish line. We want to transform flights that now take an hour,” Beffert, 51, told The Associated Press before the Gobi air taxi went on a test flight in Marina, California — located about 40 miles south. And two-hour to five-minute trips from where he grew up in the mountains.”

Archer Aviation, a Silicon Valley company backed by automakers Stellantis and United Airlines, tested its eTVOLs over farmland in Salinas, California, where a prototype called “Midnight” could be seen gliding over a tractor plowing fields in November. the past.

The tests are part of the journey by Joby Aviation and other ambitious companies that have collectively raised billions of dollars to turn flying cars into more than just the fantastical concepts popularized by the 1960s animated series, “The Jetsons,” and the sci-fi film “The Jetsons.” Blade Runner” in 1982.

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Archer Aviation and neighboring company Whisk Aero, which has ties to aerospace giant Boeing and Google co-founder Larry Page, are also at the forefront of the race to bring air taxis to the US market. Joby already has a partnership to connect air taxis to Delta Air Lines flights, while Archer Aviation has a similar alliance with United Airlines.

Flying taxis have had enough regulatory successes with the US Federal Aviation Administration that it has created a new class of aircraft called “autolift,” a step the agency has not taken since introducing helicopters for civilian use in the 1940s.

But there are more regulatory hurdles to clear before air taxis are allowed to carry passengers in the United States, making Dubai the most likely place where eVTOL planes will take commercial flights — perhaps by the end of this year.

“Developing a whole new class of vehicles is difficult,” said Adam Lim, director of Alton Aviation Consulting, a firm that tracks the industry’s development. “It’s going to be like crawling, walking, running. Right now, I think we’re still crawling. We’re not going to have a Jetsons-like reality where everyone is flying everywhere in the next two or three years.”

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China is also vying to make flying cars a reality, an endeavor that has President-elect Donald Trump interested in making cars a priority for his incoming administration over the next four years.

If the ambitions of US eVTOL pioneers come true, people will be able to take air taxis to get to and from airports serving New York and Los Angeles within the next few years.

Because its electric taxis can fly unimpeded at high speeds, Joby envisions transporting up to four Delta Air Lines passengers at a time from New York-area airports to Manhattan in about 10 minutes or less. To start, air taxi prices will almost certainly be much higher than the cost of taking a taxi or Uber from JFK to Manhattan, but the difference may narrow over time because electric helicopters should be able to carry more passengers than ground vehicles. . Stuck in traffic going in every direction.

“You’ll see highways in the sky,” predicted Adam Goldstein, CEO of Archer Aviation, during an interview at the company’s headquarters in San Jose, California. “There will be hundreds, maybe thousands of these planes flying into these individual cities, and it will really change the way cities are built.”

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Investors are betting Goldstein is right, as he helped Archer raise an additional $430 million late last year from a group that included Stellantis and United Airlines. This injection came shortly after a Japanese automaker pumped another $500 million into Joby, bringing its total investment in that company to nearly $900 million.

These investments were part of the $13 billion raised by eTVOL companies over the past five years, according to Alton Aviation.

Joby Aviation and Archer Aviation both went public in 2021 through reverse mergers, opening another avenue to raise money and making it easier to hire engineers with the appeal of stock options. Both companies have managed to lure workers away from electric car maker Tesla and rocket maker SpaceX, and in Archer’s case, raiding the ranks of Wisk Aero.

Wisk’s defections sparked a lawsuit accusing Archer of theft of intellectual property in a dispute that was resolved with a 2023 settlement that included an agreement between the two sides to cooperate on some aspects of eTVOL technology.

Before going public, Joby also acquired eTVOL technology developed by ride-sharing service Uber in an $83 million deal that also brought these two companies together as partners.

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But none of the deals or technological developments have succeeded in stopping the losses from the accumulation of companies that manufacture flying cars. Joby, whose roots go back to 2009 when Bevirt founded the company, has posted losses of $1.6 billion since its inception, while Archer has posted losses of about $1.5 billion since its founding in 2018.

As they move into commercial air taxi services, Jobe and Archer are trying to generate revenue by negotiating contracts to use their eTVOL vehicles in the US military for deliveries and other short-range missions. Archer has partnered with Anduril Industries, a military defense technology company founded by Oculus headset inventor Palmer Luckey, to help it win deals.

The uncertain prospects have left both companies with relatively low market capitalizations by technology industry standards, with Joby worth about $7 billion and Archer at $6 billion.

But Beavert sees a blue sky ahead. “eVTOLs will change the way we move,” he said. “It’s a much better way to get around. Seeing the world from the air is better than being stuck in traffic on the highway.

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