Air taxi pioneer wants to expand focus to Germany

But skepticism about the industry has rarely been as great as it is today. In the past year, the Joby share lost more than half of its value. Short sellers and regulators are putting pressure on companies.

With the company Kittyhawk, which was supported by Google co-founder Larry Page, a prominent provider has already failed. In the summer, the company advertised its air taxi ambitions with the slogan: “If anyone can do it, we can.” At the end of September, Kittyhawk announced its end.

Bevirt does not see the loss of an important rival as a fundamental setback for the industry. “We’ve had a lot of skepticism about it for years,” he says. But that doesn’t change the chances. Traditional aviation companies also believed in the future of air taxis.

The US airline Delta announced in October that it would invest $60 million in Joby. CEO Ed Bastian said: “This is a groundbreaking opportunity for Delta to offer a time-saving, unique premium solution for connecting people from their homes to the airport.” standing or having to use public transport.

Criticism of prestige transport projects

However, such a vision stands for the fundamental problems of the industry, says Canadian author Paris Marx. Instead of solving concrete problems, technology companies would get bogged down in prestige projects. “Companies have made many things worse,” Marx writes in his book “Road to Nowhere,” in which he takes a critical look at Silicon Valley’s visions of future traffic.

Public transport in the greater San Francisco area has been ailing for years. Travel times are long, and there are often cancellations and severe delays. Corporations like Apple, Alphabet or Meta have their own buses that bring their employees to their offices because public buses and trains are simply not a reliable alternative.

Nevertheless, Bevirt sees a solution to practical problems in his company’s devices. The air taxis could also take off and land in cities without disturbing local residents too much. They would also relieve road traffic. And the airplanes could help in the fight against climate change because they are powered by batteries.

However, Joby has also come under a lot of pressure. Bevirt had always presented ambitious plans for the company, which was founded in 2009. Before the IPO last year, Joby promised investors that it would be possible to have a total of 141 electric high-flyers in use by 2024. Another forecast spoke of 900 aircraft in 2026, each of which could complete up to 40 flights per day.

Production goals and reach

These goals are completely unrealistic and investors have been misled, criticized short seller Bleecker Street Research in a report. “We believe that Joby greatly overestimated his possibilities,” it said.

Joby has significantly reduced his plans to the authorities and is now only talking about the production of ten aircraft per year over the next two years at the plant near Santa Cruz. Short sellers bet on a share price falling and thus benefit when investors lose confidence in a company.

Joby CFO Matthew Allen Field, on the other hand, tried to allay concerns. Lower production numbers are not a problem, but part of the strategy. “We are building a low volume production line to validate and certify our manufacturing processes,” Field said. Once everything has been checked and tested, Joby could expand production significantly.

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The company is also in a very good financial position. “At the end of September we had $1.1 billion in cash and short-term marketable securities,” Field said.

However, Bevirt admitted that the approval process at the US aviation authorities is taking longer than originally thought. Instead of 2024, 2025 is now the target for commercial flight operations. Much of the technology is developed internally, says Bevirt: “We design and build our own motors, wiring systems and battery packs.” The battery cells, in turn, come from suppliers to the automotive industry.

According to observers, the decisive factor for the breakthrough is whether Joby can guarantee a sufficient range with the purely electric drive. A prototype flew the equivalent of almost 250 kilometers in 2021 – remotely controlled and without passengers, said Bevirt. Even with four passengers, a pilot and luggage, the range will “not significantly” fall below 160 kilometers. This is completely sufficient for the intended short-haul flights.

The question about the noise

One issue is likely to continue to be a problem in the future: noise pollution during take-off and landing. Although Joby’s machines are quieter than conventional helicopters, there can be no question of a silent flight. The topic is likely to concern Bevirt in the upcoming approval procedures – after all, local politicians in New York, for example, have been fighting for years against an expansion of the flight licenses.

“We’ve been working on sound for more than a decade,” explains Bevirt, “both on the noise level and the sound profile of the machines.” the founder. There is no corresponding noise development with his machines.

But the same applies to Joby: If the neighbor lands, you don’t want to be right next to it, said Bevirt. “Our goal is an almost noiseless overflight.” So far, the Joby machines are just under 65 decibels at a distance of one hundred meters – that’s exactly the limit of what human ears find disturbing.

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