High Times In The Sky

No Gas Needed

Welcome to Go Above Traffic.

The eVTOL newsletter that’s as delightful as picking the fastest lane when you’re in traffic.

Let’s get into it.

What you need to know in eVTOLs this week

EHang

Chinese based EHang has delivered a batch of 27 pilotless eVTOLs to Wencheng County Transportation Development Group Co Ltd. in Zhejiang, China,.

This brings the total deliverers to 263.

Wencheng will gradually build operation center and supporting infrastructure to prepare for the launch of the EHang aerial sightseeing services.

They must be very optimistic about how popular the tours are going to be because they’ve ordered an additional 270 devices to be delivered by 2026.

Beta Technologies

Beta Technologies announced a prototype model of its Alia eVTOL successfully executed a piloted inflight transition from vertical lift to conventional forward flight.

While it’s only a prototype aircraft, it’s still a big milestone for the Virginia based company.

While most eVTOL companies are sticking to moving people around, Beta’s aircraft is also configured with an enlarged rear door in order to facilitate its utilization as a cargo transportation asset.

Back in 2021, shipping giant UPS announced plans to acquire ten Alia series aircraft to be delivered in 2024 (with an option for 140 more) but not much has been said about the delivery or the partnership recently.

Wisk Aero

Boeing subsidiary Wisk Aero acquired Vorocel, a software verification and validation (V&V) company focused on the certification of aerospace software - particularly around autonomous design.

Wisk is staring down a very rigorous certification process as they plan to launch a pilotless, autonomous eVTOL right out of the gate. The acquisition of Verocel is intended to get that ball rolling faster.

Going straight to autonomous aircraft from day one is a huge bet for Wisk. Other players in the space plan to launch piloted eVTOL services before eventually transitioning to autonomous.

Wisk will need to leap frog the competition that has piloted eVTOL up and running before them.

Lilium

Last month Lilium announced a partnership with “UrbanLink Air Mobility” a newly formed eVTOL operator in South Florida that purchased 20 aircraft.

A critical partner has been added to the mix - Ferrovial Vertiports.

eVTOL’s will only be as good as the infrastructure supporting them, which makes vertiport developers key players.

Ferrovial will support UrbanLink's goal to launch commercial operations in South Florida by 2026 and later expand to other key markets across the country.

Archer Aviation

Archer Aviation plans to launch its aerial rideshare service in South San Francisco, Napa, San Jose, Oakland, and Livermore.

Real estate giant Kilroy Realty Corp signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) to make the 50-acre Kilroy Oyster Point waterfront campus in South San Francisco the anchor of Archer’s planned network.

We’ll be taking that MoU with a grain of salt as its a non binding agreement. California, and San Francisco in particular, are infamous for the regulations, so a lot of hoops to jump through.

Joby Aviation

If you’ve ever wanted to see what a world class eVTOL manufacturing facility looks like, this video is for you.

The Markets

Or “The Casino” if you prefer the Wall Street Bets mentality…

Slight uptick this week with the exception of a couple players.

As usual, the week over week changes with pre-revenue companies is less about the business and more about the market sentiment, so ups and downs are to be expected.

But we’ll take the minor tail wind.

The $100K Life Savings Bet

“SWING HARD AT FAT PITCHES…”

— Shaan Puri

If you haven’t heard of Shaan Puri, he founded and sold a few companies and knows what he’s talking about. His My First Million Podcast is worth checking out.

He goes on to say that some common fat pitches are: - platform shift (eg. iphone app store) - law change - new tech breakthru - market panic sells (on sale!) - opportunity to work at a generational company early (eg. Facebook 2004-2008) - someone owns something but doesnt realize what its worth.

So the question is - are eVTOLs a fat pitch?

And if so, is Joby the right one to swing hard at?

The $100K I have invested tells you my answer - I am swinging for the fences.

So are we in the money?!

Nope.

We’re at $97K, so a few grand under our break even of $100K.

A lot of lumpy movement in the stock price over the last few months but nothing extreme.

Better to keep an eye on the trend over the next couple years.

Can’t be bothered by the week over week noise.

Lighten Up

A much younger looking Elon Musk said this in 2014.

Has anyone told him how quite eVTOLs are these days?

Final Question

What’s your response to people that say eVTOLs will only benefit wealthy communities?

— best reply gets a shoutout next week.

Best Answer From Last Week

I asked “What will be your pre-flight routine before getting on an eVTOL?”

Best reply came from Steve in Colorado:

“If it’s anything like my pre-flight routine, it’s complaining the TSA PreCheck line isn’t moving fast enough. Then buying an overpriced Fiji water and beef jerky from a mini-mart.”

Second Best reply came from Tom in Arizona:

“I’ll tell you what my routine wont be - eating Panda Express like I did at Chicago O’Hare. Never doing that again.”

Thanks for reading and let us know what you want to see more of next week. We read every single reply.

Stay above.

— The Above Traffic Team

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