Air Courtage Assurances is to provide ‘the world’s first EVTOL insurance product’ exclusively for clients of the Axe by Skyfly. The company has designed official in-house insurance coverage for members of the UK Light Aircraft Association (LAA), which is expected to be the first organisation to certify the Axe EVTOL.
Skyfly CCO Jaap Rademaker commented: “With series production underway for the Axe EVTOL and our first customers due to receive their aircraft next year, we turned to Air Courtage to develop a bespoke insurance product for owners of our Axe EVTOL.
“Air Courtage immediately understood the unique aspects of our design with its four wings, 8 fixed-angle motors, and ballistic parachute. The four wings enable the Axe to fly like a fixed-wing airplane whilst it is also able to fly like a helicopter, taking off and landing vertically.
“Air Courtage made the case to underwriters that the Axe is demonstrably safer than both airplanes and helicopters.”
Founded in France in 1999, Air Courtage Assurances insures approximately 26,000 aircraft in Europe, of which almost half are kit-built or light aircraft like the Axe EVTOL. The LAA is expected to become the first national body to certify the Axe EVTOL in 2024.
Air Courtage Assurances group CEO Caroline Cognet Renard added: “The Axe EVTOL fits perfectly in our global strategy to package, with our insurance partners, the right solutions. SkyFly has over 30,000 pilots and more than 1,600 UAV operators already insured through Air Courtage.”
Air Courtage will underwrite the Axe EVTOL insurance, a process made easier because of the Axe’s many layers of safety redundancy, and because the Axe is a fully-functioning fixed-wing aircraft, something which insurers are already familiar with.
Laurent Détroyat, strategic commercial development lead at Air Courtage Assurances, continued: “This is the first aircraft of its kind that links the known personal fixed–wing aircraft environment with the real novelty of electric vertical takeoff and landing aircraft. From the specifications presented, this aircraft can glide.”
Maud Badot, Skyfly project manager at Air Courtage Assurances, concluded: “Thanks to the thoroughly calculated, clear and transparent information provided by Skyfly, we have been able to find a leading global player in the insurance industry ready to accompany us to manage the risk of this project.”