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Vertical Aerospace secures first eVTOL Design Organisation Approval by UK CAA

Ver­ti­cal Aero­space has secured the first ever Design Organ­i­sa­tion Approval (DOA) issued to an eVTOL man­u­fac­tur­er by the UK Civ­il Avi­a­tion Author­i­ty for the VX4, which autho­ris­es Ver­ti­cal to con­duct design activ­i­ties and issue design approvals.

UK and Euro­pean aero­space com­pa­nies can­not hold a Type Cer­tifi­cate with­out being grant­ed a DOA. As an approved Design Organ­i­sa­tion, Ver­ti­cal will have increas­ing author­i­ty and priv­i­leges to progress through design and cer­ti­fi­ca­tion of the VX4.

This approval means the CAA is sat­is­fied that Ver­ti­cal has the capa­bil­i­ty to design safe and reli­able air­craft and avi­a­tion-relat­ed prod­ucts to the high­est stan­dards. This is expect­ed to stream­line the steps towards obtain­ing Type Cer­ti­fi­ca­tion.

The process for achiev­ing DOA involved a rig­or­ous assess­ment of Vertical’s pro­ce­dures, its qual­i­ty man­age­ment sys­tem, the com­pe­tence of its tech­ni­cal work­force, and the nec­es­sary facil­i­ties and equip­ment to sup­port the design activ­i­ties to cer­ti­fy the VX4 air­craft.

Ear­li­er this month, the CAA announced its inten­tion to adopt Euro­pean Union Avi­a­tion Safe­ty Agency’s (EASA) Means of Com­pli­ance to Spe­cial Con­di­tion for small-cat­e­go­ry VTOL air­craft (SC-VTOL), the stan­dards against which Euro­pean and now UK man­u­fac­tur­ers will design eVTOLs.

Ver­ti­cal con­tin­ues work­ing close­ly with the CAA on the Type Cer­ti­fi­ca­tion of its VX4 air­craft, hav­ing recent­ly sub­mit­ted its cer­ti­fi­ca­tion basis pro­pos­al to the reg­u­la­tor. This posi­tions the UK along­side Europe as a mar­ket with a clear reg­u­la­to­ry frame­work for design­ing and man­u­fac­tur­ing these air­craft.

Fol­low­ing the Japan Civ­il Avi­a­tion Bureau’s (JCAB) accep­tance of the VX4’s val­i­da­tion pro­gramme, Ver­ti­cal part­nered with Japan Air­lines for up to 100 VX4 pre-orders with Avolon, as well as Marubeni Cor­po­ra­tion for up to 200 VX4 pre-orders.

JCAB is the fourth avi­a­tion reg­u­la­tor Ver­ti­cal is work­ing close­ly with on Type Cer­ti­fi­ca­tion and con­cur­rent val­i­da­tion with EASA and the US Fed­er­al Avi­a­tion Author­i­ty (FAA). Ver­ti­cal is also in dis­cus­sions with the Nation­al Civ­il Avi­a­tion Agency of Brazil on the VX4’s future val­i­da­tion pro­gramme.

Stephen Fitz­patrick, Vertical’s founder and CEO, said: “This approval is a crit­i­cal step for­ward in our mis­sion to decar­bonise air trav­el and bring the UK’s first elec­tric air­craft to mar­ket.”

Paul Harp­er, Vertical’s head of cer­ti­fi­ca­tion, added: “Receiv­ing a DOA from the CAA is a tes­ta­ment to our team and the hard work we are doing to ensure safe­ty is at the core of the VX4. This will give us a com­pet­i­tive edge in bring­ing the VX4 into ser­vice.”

Gar­ry Lath­ey, Design and Cer­ti­fi­ca­tion Man­ag­er at the UK Civ­il Avi­a­tion Author­i­ty, com­ment­ed: “Grant­i­ng a DOA to Ver­ti­cal empha­sis­es our com­mit­ment to mak­ing the UK a key des­ti­na­tion for avi­a­tion inno­va­tors.”

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Jason Pritchard

Jason Pritchard is the Editor of eVTOL Insights. He holds a BA from Leicester's De Montfort University and has worked in Journalism and Public Relations for more than a decade. Outside of work, Jason enjoys playing and watching football and golf. He also has a keen interest in Ancient Egypt.

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