e-flight-journal

Today Rolls Royce electrical announced that they will supply the propulsion and lift system for Vertical Aerospace’s VX-4X eVTOL.

Rolls-Royce will design the system architecture of the whole electrical propulsion system, the electric power system that includes their latest 100kW-class lift and push electrical propulsion units, the power distribution and the monitoring system that will support operations.

More info at Rolls Royce here & at Vertical Aerospace here and more in the next e-flight-journal magazine

Joby Aviation has spent more than a decade developing piloted, all-electric, vertical takeoff and landing passenger aircraft, with over 1,000 test flights conducted to date. Intends to operate clean, quiet and affordable air taxi service starting in 2024. First company to agree certification basis for an eVTOL aircraft with FAA. First company to be granted airworthiness approval for an eVTOL aircraft by U.S. Air Force. Joby has strategic partnership with Toyota for production and recently acquired Uber ElevateTransaction values combined company at $6.6 billion post-money equity value, and is expected to provide approximately $1.6 billion in gross proceeds

Full press release: https://www.jobyaviation.com/news/joby-aviation-to-list-on-nyse-through-merger-with-reinvent-technology-partners/

firt flying video of Joby eVTOL:

CEO and Founder, JoeBen Bevirt introduced the company vision. Note the takeoff noise at the end of the video:

The new issue of the e-flight Journal is out with some very interesting stories:

3 • Editorial:

Is the hype in market capital good for
electric aviation? an Analyse from Xin Guo
(click to read more )

8 • eNews around the world
14 • Joby Acquired Uber Elevate
16 • 3. e-flight forum China, online
21 • Tecnam P-Volt Electric Commuter
23 • VoltAero’s Cassio electric commuter
26 • Hydrogen Aviation on the Horizon
30 • PIPISTREL:
30 • Alpha Electro
36 • Velis Electro
38 • Interview with Tine Tomažič
42 • RX1E-A
48 • Spark Solo, a touring motor-glider?
54 • Power generator for e-VTOLS
56 • 2. e-flight garden talk: D3
60 • World Overview: eVTOLs

For Info AERO 2021 postpones and first AERO ASIA announced for autumn 2021 https://www.aero-expo.com/aero-en/press/press-releases.php?obj_id=393&sMode=detail
https://www.aero-expo.com/aero-de/news/AERO-ASIA-2021.php

Today the Commercial Aircraft Corporation of China (COMAC, ARJ21 & C919 jet manufacturer)’s Beijing Research Center unveiled the fuel cell-powered eVTOL prototype. Official press release not yet published. Will update when new information come out. A 50% sub-scale model has flown for a while.

The above is the 50% sub-scale model

Lilium’s founder and CEO Daniel Wiegand recently had an interview with a German newspaper „Frankfurter Allgemeine“. Daniel revealed quite some interesting information in this interview such as their product development plan and fund raising situation and IPO plan. The link is in German but you can use google translate to read it:

https://zeitung.faz.net/faz/unternehmen/2021-01-05/5c6d3053508b808dcce6e4f024fd7fc6/?GEPC=s3

The startup from South Burlington, Vermont, USA
(www.beta.team) presented this prototype earlier this month. The aircraft looks a bit like a cross bread between a conventional helicopter, a fixed wing aircraft and some other existing lift and cruise designs.

They did fly their first eVTOL Prototype in 2018 based on a modified Fixed Wing Aircraft.

More info at https://www.wired.com/story/new-air-taxi-design-cues-far-flying-bird/ and at the e-flight-forum.com -China 2020- with Presenters from the leading companies and authorities world wide like Pipistrel, Volocopter, Joby and Rolls Royce.

www.e-flight-forum.com

The 4th International e-flight-forum China is ramping up as life streamed bilingual online Forum from december 08-10 three half days from 8:30-13:00 CET. more info at www.e-flight-forum.com.

Four years after Uber published the first Elevate whitepaper in October 2016 which literally launched eVTOL and UAM market, now Uber Elevate published a new whitepaper named „Uber Air: Designing for the Community“. As several eVTOL companies including both Uber Elevate partners and non-partners have been in the process of certification, it should be no surprise that Uber Elevate now shift its focus to ecosystem and community build up to prepare for the initial operation in the near future.

This whitepaper PDF file is available for downloading at:

https://d1nyezh1ys8wfo.cloudfront.net/static/Uber+Air_Designing+for+the+Community.pdf

on September 30, 2020 the Chinese eVTOL manufactuer Ehang unveil a large capacity cargo eVTOL drone based on its „216“ passenger eVTOL called „216 cargo model“ which has 200kg payload 200kg and has been test flying in China. Ehang intends to use it for various logistics delivery cases.