For more than a half century, much of the urban experience has been built around the needs and capabilities of automobiles. Now China is experimenting with a framework built around air taxis to create the world’s first drone hotel. Expand
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Led by Volvo owner Geely, air-taxi Volocopter has raised $55M and hopes to bring the passenger drone and services to market in the next two to three years. The company’s focus has not been on the US market due to regulatory challenges.
On Tuesday, Boeing’s autonomous air taxi completed its first flight in Manassas, Va. The aircraft takes off and lands vertically (VTOL) but transitions into a horizontal flight path once airborne. A number of other companies, such as Bell, Volocopter, and eHang are developing similar air taxis.
Zephyr Airworks, Kitty Hawk’s operator in New Zealand, just announced that they entered into a partnership with Air New Zealand. Kitty Hawk is the company behind the Cora passenger or taxi drone and is funded by Google co-founder Larry Page and CEO-ed by Sebastian Thrun, the self-driving car pioneer who is the founding director of Google’s X lab.
The collaboration between Zephyr Airworks and Air New Zealand aims to bring the world’s first autonomous electric air taxi service to market in New Zealand. Various companies around the world are working to bring air taxis or passenger drones to the market. Other examples are Volocopter, Workhorse, eHang, Airbus and Bell Helicopter.
Philippine inventor, Kyxz Mendiola unveiled a passenger drone. He calls it a flying sports car that represents the future of transportation. He drove it out of a warehouse and took off among a cheering crowd, leaving them all in a cloud of dust.
Morris Mbetsa, a mostly self-taught inventor and electrical engineer, has built the first passenger drone in Africa. Inspired by companies like Uber and Volocopter, Morris set out to create this prototype to show the world that the people in Africa have the brain power to develop passenger drones, and ultimately to be the first nation in the world with flying taxis
From Electrek:
The flying taxi company Kitty Hawk last night launched ‘Cora’, a Vertical Takeoff and Landing (VTOL) personal airplane/helicopter drone hybrid that will carry a passenger. Kitty Hawk is funded by Google co-founder Larry Page and CEO-ed by Sebastian Thrun, the self-driving car pioneer who is the founding director of Google’s X lab. Expand
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From Electrek:
Improvements in battery technology are quickly starting to enable manned electric flight, which some companies now want to combine with drones.
Audi and Airbus partnered with Italdesign to work together on a passenger drone/electric car hybrid concept. Expand
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Only two years ago at CES in Las Vegas, Ehang promised to deliver an autonomous, passenger-carrying taxi-drone and in a video released by Ehang today, it shows that they have. Over the last couple of months, Ehang has conducted over 1,000 test flights with human passengers on board. In the video below they even show how they send their company officials for a test flight in the Ehang 184.
During the CES 2018 event in Las Vegas, the Volocopter 2X, an 18-rotor air taxi drone, made its debut flight. Volocopter works closely together with Intel and after the tech giant completed their keynote presentation, the taxi drone to make its short first flight over the stage. Granted it was a very short flight but the first, nonetheless for Volocopter in North America.
Uber and Bell Helicopter are showing off a four-passenger taxi drone simulator at CES this year. The drone is meant to fly people from A to B on fixed routes, for instance from a train station or parking garage to an airport. The drone can be flown manually by a pilot or it can fly itself. Neither Uber or Bell offered any details on the propulsion system, unfortunately. We do know however that it has VTOL capability, i.e. vertical take-off and landing.
Workhorse’s Surefly personal helicopter drone was first shown to the public during the Paris Air Show in June of 2017. Now we have learned that Workhorse has received an Experimental Airworthiness Certificate from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to fly their personal drone during the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas next week.
The Surefly is a hybrid octocopter that can carry two passengers. The aerial vehicle can be flown manually with a joystick. Something that should be as easy as flying a DJI drone, according to Workhorse. Or it can be flown in a fully autonomous (drone) mode using sense-and-avoid technology to bring its passengers safely to their destination. A 4-cylinder gasoline engine charges the batteries, which in turn power the electric motors for the eight propellers. The personal helicopter has a range of 70 miles and can lift 400 lbs. The rotor arms can be folded as shown in the photos below.
Drone taxi EHang 184 was introduced at the World Internet Conference in Wuzhen, Zhejiang Province in China on December 4, 2017. The drone taxi has automatic navigation and can take off and land vertically. No runway needed.
Dubai has had their first test-flights with the drone, called the Autonomous Air Taxi (AAT). The city claims that the vehicle will be the world’s first “self-flying taxi service.” The AAT was supplied by the German manufacturer Volocopter and offers an environmentally friendly, fully electric ‘cab flight’. The prototype has a maximum flight time of 30 minutes at a cruising speed of 31 mph. Its maximum speed is 62mph.
CityAirbus, chief engineer Marius Bebesel confirmed this week that Airbus expects to have the flying taxi in the air in 2018, after successfully completing ground tests of the electric power system that they will use to propel the vehicle through the air.
The advent of both the drone industry and electric passenger cars are culminating into drones capable of transporting people or more accurately described as vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) electric aircraft.
A new startup came out of stealth mode today to launch their own entry in this new burgeoning passenger drone industry. Expand
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