Category: Vehicles/Manufactures

Flying Car Startups Emerge in Israel

27 November 2018 || 3 min read

After selling his IoT software company to General Electric in 2017, Israeli entrepreneur Guy Kaplinsky has has founded flying car startup ‘New Future Transportation’. “The need for change is obvious, due to the increasing congestion in large cities and the ever-increasing traffic problems.” Says Kaplinsky, who plans to develop a flying car that can effectively take to the road as...

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Guy Kaplinsky future flying car

MIT Engineers Fly Plane Powered With Ionic Wind

24 November 2018 || 3 min read

What a flying car powered by ionic wind may one day look like. Scientists at MIT hit a major breakthrough earlier this week when they competed test flights of a model airplane powered completely by ionic wind. This means the aircraft had no moving parts, was completely silent, and produced absolutely no carbon emissions. It was also fully electric. A...

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An Ionic Wind Flying Car Concept

SkyGrid is a new company jointly founded by Boeing and SparkCognition to build AI-powered software for managing airspace with autonomous vehicles. SkyGrid’s purpose is to integrate all urban airspace traffic including cargo and passenger air vehicles as well as package delivery drones. According to its website, “SkyGrid is the world’s first artificial intelligence and blockchain-powered aerial operating system for next-generation...

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Jetcopter Releases New VTOL Concept

20 November 2018 || 4 min read

In early September, Jetcopter showed the world its concept for a jet-powered VTOL. Now, it has re-iterated the design with a larger version that can fit up to seven passengers.   In September, we noted Jetcopter’s unique design concept–it’s one of the only VTOLs that will be powered by jets rather than propellers. Earlier this week, Jetcopter released concept images...

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Jetcopter VTOL

Dufour Aerospace Announces Senior Advisory Team

16 November 2018 || 4 min read

Dufour Aerospace is a unique VTOL start-up based in Switzerland. It’s mission is to develop a passenger VTOL for areas like the Swiss Alps, where mountainous terrain can cause extremely long travel times between cities. The Dufour team has already made significant progress by developing an electric airplane that has proven flight up to one hour, multiple times per day....

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They’re Great for Cars, But Not so Much Urban Aviation Over the last 20 years, batteries have been one of the slowest developed hardware components in the world. Solar power, advanced materials, and next generation manufacturing processes have all sparked new business and provided the technological momentum to create new industries. All but the battery. In order for the Urban...

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Tesla P90D

The goal of Rensselaer’s latest research center is to pursue cutting-edge research in vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL) aircraft technologies. Earlier this month, the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) held a ribbon cutting ceremony attended by Uber Elevate Director of Engineering Mark Moore, as well as representatives from Terrafugia, Boeing, Aurora Flight Sciences, and Bell. While the opening of RPI MOVE...

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RPI Opens MOVE-Center for Mobility with Vertical Lift

The Lilium air taxi is getting closer to market. It recently hired Mirko Reuter, former head of Automated Driving at Audi, Jakob Waeschenbach, former head of Equipment Installation at Airbus, and Rochus Moenter, former Vice President of Finance and Leasing at Airbus. Lilium is a German company based out of Munich. Its air taxi design is one of the sleekest on the market, and...

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Lilium Air Taxi hires from Audi and Airbus

A few weeks after delivering its first S3 Hoverbike to the Dubai Police, Hoversurf has transitioned its leadership to new CEO Steve Weinstein. Weinstein has been with Hoversurf as its Strategic Advisor since early 2018. During the year, he led Hoversurf’s partnerships with aerospace and fabrication companies, and has been raising awareness for the Series A funding round, which will...

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Dubai Police Train on Hoverbike

Bell has added yet another company to its growing list of partners for the Bell Air Taxi project. This time, it’s Electric Power Systems (EPS). Bell’s original design for the air taxi was full electric, but since further feasibility analysis, it has made the switch to hybrid electric. Bell also made this move to try to stick to its goal...

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Bell Air Taxi

The Terrafugia TF-2 Concept Video

06 November 2018 || 4 min read

The Terrafugia TF-2 is a unique concept transportation solution featuring a passenger pod or cargo pod that switches between road and air transport. In the air, the Terrafugia TF-2 is a large hybrid-electric VTOL with a fixed wing, and capacity of up to four passengers or 1400lbs of cargo. On the ground, it looks surprisingly similar to a futuristic city...

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Jean Botti, former CTO of Airbus Group, joined the TransportUP podcast last week detail his journey founding VoltAero, a company that is developing a general aviation-sized hybrid electric airplane capable of flights up to 3.5 hours. According to Botti, the vision of his company is to provide alternatives to Cessna or Cirrus aircraft. Those companies offer similar sized general aviation...

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Voltaero Hyrbrid Electric Aircraft Concept

DARPA Tests Semi-Autonomous Sikorsky Helicopter

02 November 2018 || 3 min read

The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) recently flight-demonstrated a modified Sikorsky S-76B helicopter with impressive semi-autonomous capabilities. The ALIAS system, which stands for Aircrew Labor In-Cockpit Automation System, made its first manned flight on October 17th 2018. This flight was named as ‘optionally manned’, indicating the potential for full autonomy of the modified Sikorsky-76B. The goal of the ALIAS...

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DARPA Helicopter with Semi-Autnomy

On October 17th, XTI Aircraft announced the sale of one of its TriFan 600 aircraft to Sáo Paulo’s Icon Aviation. Icon Aviation is the largest business aircraft operator in South America. Its fleet consists of 30 private jets, as well as a range of helicopters. The order from Icon also comes with options for Icon to purchase an undisclosed number...

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Carter Aviation is a Texas-based firm that develops “Slow Rotor/Compound technology (SR/C™)” for vertical take off and landing aircraft that combines with the efficiency of a fixed-wing airplane with the vertical take-off ability of a helicopter. Carter debuted its first VTOL prototype in 1998. Now, it has released concept images of its newest eVTOL design in line with Uber Elevate’s...

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Carter Aviation's newest eVTOL concept