Urban Aeronautics partners up with Universal Avionics to enhance the safety of its CityHawk eVTOL aircraft

Israel aero­space com­pa­ny Urban Aero­nau­tics has announced a new part­ner­ship with Uni­ver­sal Avion­ics, an Elbit Sys­tems com­pa­ny and a lead­ing man­u­fac­tur­er of inno­v­a­tive com­mer­cial avion­ics sys­tems.

The Israeli aero­space com­pa­ny is cre­at­ing the world’s first com­pact, hydro­gen-pow­ered eVTOL air­craft designed for repeat­ed use, with max­i­mum pub­lic ben­e­fit as air taxis and ambu­lance ser­vices in crowd­ed, urban envi­ron­ments.

This part­ner­ship will fea­ture Uni­ver­sal Avion­ics’ ClearVi­sion™ Enhanced Flight Vision Sys­tem (EFVS) solu­tion togeth­er with the Aper­ture™ Advanced Video Man­age­ment Device in Urban Aero­nau­tics’ City­Hawk air taxi and emer­gency med­ical ser­vices (EMS) vehi­cles. City­Hawk has been in devel­op­ment since 2006 and com­plet­ed more than 300 suc­cess­ful test flights, fea­tur­ing a dis­tinct, wing­less exte­ri­or and patent­ed ful­ly-enclosed Fan­craft™ rotor sys­tem.

This com­bi­na­tion will enhance air­craft safe­ty through sen­sor fusion and aug­ment­ed real­i­ty. Uni­ver­sal’s tech­nol­o­gy is an impor­tant safe­ty fea­ture for urban flight, espe­cial­ly dur­ing take­off and land­ing in crowd­ed and con­fined spaces. 

Urban Aero­nau­tics CEO Nim­rod Golan-Yanay, said: “This part­ner­ship is par­tic­u­lar­ly excit­ing in that it offers the City­Hawk and our pilots improved vis­i­bil­i­ty and agili­ty for every ride, whether it be trans­fer­ring pas­sen­gers from an office build­ing down­town to an apart­ment build­ing down­town or evac­u­at­ing a patient to a hos­pi­tal.

“As a pilot for over 25 years, I know first­hand how pow­er­ful this tech­nol­o­gy is, and what a valu­able step this part­ner­ship is in mak­ing urban air mobil­i­ty a safe and enjoy­able real­i­ty for both pilots and pas­sen­gers.”

This tech­nol­o­gy part­ner­ship also pro­vides an unprece­dent­ed lev­el of agili­ty for City­Hawk’s EMS and com­mer­cial trav­el use cas­es, offer­ing improved weath­er and traf­fic han­dling, height­ened night vision, and enhanced land­ing and ground move­ment by assist­ing the City­Hawk in adept­ly nav­i­gat­ing city infra­struc­tures.

Uni­ver­sal Avion­ics will pro­vide a wear­able head­set for pilots, a sen­sor pack­age, a sen­sor fusion and aug­ment­ed real­i­ty plat­form that, togeth­er, will pro­vide a new lev­el of sit­u­a­tion­al aware­ness and improved deci­sion mak­ing for the pilot of a City­Hawk.

The com­pa­ny is a lead­ing man­u­fac­tur­er of inno­v­a­tive com­mer­cial avion­ics sys­tems offer­ing retro­fit and for­ward-fit solu­tions for the largest diver­si­fi­ca­tion of air­craft types in the indus­try.

Togeth­er with its par­ent com­pa­ny, Elbit Sys­tems, it is a mar­ket leader in Enhanced Flight Vision Sys­tems. Start­ing with the first ever EVS to be cer­ti­fied for oper­a­tional cred­its – EVS‑I cer­ti­fied in 2001, Uni­ver­sal and Elbit have deliv­ered near­ly 3,000 EVS cam­eras world­wide for 22 air­craft types.

Uni­ver­sal Avion­ics CEO Dror Yahav, said: “Our mis­sion at Uni­ver­sal Avion­ics is to shape the future of avi­a­tion by cre­at­ing com­mer­cial avion­ics solu­tions that enhance safe­ty and effi­cien­cy, and to deliv­er an out­stand­ing cus­tomer expe­ri­ence. We are thrilled to bring our best-in-class tech­nol­o­gy to the urban air mobil­i­ty space. We know eVTOLs are the future, and we’re hap­py to have a part­ner that is both inno­v­a­tive and advanced with this unique tech­nol­o­gy.”

This part­ner­ship announce­ment comes as Urban Aero­nau­tics pre­pares to close its Series A fund­ing round and in the wake of recent part­ner­ships with oth­er lead­ing names in eVTOL and aero­space tech­nol­o­gy.

This includes Urban Aero­nau­tics’ research part­ner­ship with Lon­don-based Sky­ports to explore require­ments for eVTOL infra­struc­ture in the Mid­dle East region, and anoth­er part­ner­ship between Urban Aero­nau­tics and Cal­i­for­nia-based Hypoint to adapt hydro­gen-fuel-cell tech­nol­o­gy for avi­a­tion.