It's like a helicopter, a plane and a Tesla had a baby

Your weekly serving of eVTOL news is here.

A lot going on so let’s get right into it!

What you need to know in eVTOLs this week

Lilium

The wealthiest people in the world need a faster way to get to the French Riviera, and Lilium is here to help.

The Munich based start up is working with UrbanV, an Italian vertiport operator, and Nice Côte d'Azur Airport to get an eVTOL network up and running in the region.

It’s a good week for Lilium as they also secured a $114M investment.

The fresh cash should be a sigh of relief as fellow German eVTOL manufacturer Volocopter is flirting with bankruptcy and scrambling to find funding.

Archer Aviation

The FAA issued the final airworthiness criteria for Archer Aviation’s Midnight aircraft.

What does that mean and why does it matter?

It means Archer has now unlocked the ability to work with the FAA to obtain the remaining approvals on its certification and test plans.

The FAA has a rigorous, and sometimes changing, process for certification so it’s a step in the right direciton for Archer, but they still have a long way to go.

Next step is pilot test flights scheduled for later this year.

EHang

The worlds first eVTOL passenger flight has been completed. And the honor goes to EHang.

They flew the “EH216-S” in Abu Dhabi, carrying Mohamed Al Dhaheri, a board member at one of their local partners.

The company also flew two other eVTOLs designed for carrying cargo and firefighting at the same location.

There are a lot of eyes on eVTOLs in the UAE.

Members of the Emirati royal family attended the event and the Abu Dhabi Investment Office is now supporting EHang’s efforts to enter the Gulf market as a strategic partner.

Joby Aviation

Joby Aviation became the first eVTOL company to have their Safety Management System accepted into the FAA's voluntary SMS program.

They’ve also officially passed Stage 1 of International Standards for Business Aircraft Operations (IS-BAO) audit.

Is that a big deal?

Yes. There will certainly be a first mover advantage so getting to market quickly is critical. And obtaining certification is a must to make that happen.

Secondly, start ups like Joby are perpetually losing money, so getting hung up in the certification process is extremely costly and puts a company in a dangerous financial position.

Sarla

There is a new eVTOL player coming out of Bengaluru, India.

It’s called Sarla and it was founded two former Lilium employees and another from Joby Aviation.

So far, the company raised an undisclosed amount of capital from two India based venture firms, Theia Ventures and Campus Fund.

Sarla claims to achieved a successful maiden flight with a prototype eVTOL in February.

They plan to build a 6 passenger eVTOL that is 100 times safer than a helicopter so this pre-seed funding is the starting point for a long road head to be successful.

The Markets

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

Same story as last week - more red than green.

Keeping our eye on the long term.

The Life Savings Bet

"Given a 10% chance of a 100 times payoff, you should take that bet every time." — Jeff Bezos

Love him, or hate him, Jeffery B is worth billions of dollars. So he must have some clue what he’s doing.

Does Joby fit the criteria? Is there a 10% chance of 100 times profit on the $100K I invested?

We’re going to find out.

So are we in the money?!

Exact same place we were last week. Which is not in the money. We are down about $8K.

Someone could argue its a buying opportunity.

That someone is me.

Might be time to load up on more Joby stock?

Lighten Up

Final Question

What state will be the last to adopt eVTOLs? — best reply gets a shoutout next week.

Best Answer From Last Week

I asked “What eVTOL company would you put your life savings into and why?”

Best reply came from Leslie in South Carolina.

“Putting you life savings in a single stock is too brave for me. If you have enough money in a saving, retirement account/401K and looking to place an additional bet on something that’s a bit of a flyer, I think any eVTOL company is a good option.

Who knows, any one of them could go crazy like Crypto.”

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