America Marine Corps Pays Archer a Visit, Shows increasing interest in Midnight Aircraft by U.S Military

Archer Avi­a­tion can do wrong, at present. After news broke last week that the Unit­ed States Air­force (USAF) had signed con­tracts worth USD142 mil­lion with the com­pa­ny includ­ing for the deliv­ery of up to six Mid­night Air­craft, Archer had a vis­it last Fri­day from the U.S Marine Corps (USMC).

The com­pa­ny duti­ful­ly show­cased its air­craft to a group of USMC lead­ers, where the com­pa­ny points out in a press release, “The vis­it is an indi­ca­tion of the grow­ing inter­est in Archer’s Mid­night air­craft across the U.S mil­i­tary.”

The release con­tin­ues, “With Archer recent­ly com­plet­ing the man­u­fac­tur­ing of its first Mid­night air­craft, Depart­ment of Defense per­son­nel have indi­cat­ed they recog­nise that with its ver­ti­cal take­off and land­ing capa­bil­i­ties, tar­get pay­load of approx­i­mate­ly 1,000lbs, pro­pri­etary elec­tric pow­er­train sys­tem, and low noise pro­file, the air­craft rep­re­sents a poten­tial par­a­digm shift in mil­i­tary avi­a­tion and oper­a­tions.”

U.S Air Force and Archer sign new con­tracts worth up to $142 Mil­lion, includes deliv­ery of up to six Mid­night eVTOL air­craft

Along­side Joby, whom the mil­i­tary has also shown a keen inter­est, “(These) air­craft,” explains the release, “Hold the promise of enhanc­ing rapid response, agili­ty, and oper­a­tional effec­tive­ness across a wide range of mis­sion pro­files, from per­son­nel trans­port and logis­tics sup­port to res­cue oper­a­tions and more. eVTOLs are expect­ed to pro­vide a much safer and qui­eter alter­na­tive to heli­copters while being more cost-effec­tive for the U.S. mil­i­tary to trans­port, oper­ate and main­tain in the field.”

Retired 2‑Star Gen­er­al and Archer Gov­ern­ment Ser­vices Advi­so­ry Board Mem­ber, Clay Hut­mach­er, com­ment­ed, “The low cost, low noise, high safe­ty nature of Archer’s Mid­night makes it a very com­pelling air­craft for all branch­es of the U.S. mil­i­tary to inte­grate into their fleet. We con­tin­ue to see increas­ing inter­est in the capa­bil­i­ties of eVTOL air­craft across the mil­i­tary.” 

Archer is work­ing close­ly with the mem­bers of its Gov­ern­ment Ser­vices Advi­so­ry Board to more ful­ly engage with U.S. gov­ern­ment and pub­lic safe­ty agen­cies around the coun­try “to explore oppor­tu­ni­ties to com­mer­cialise its air­craft.”

On the back of this recent inter­est from the U.S Mil­i­tary, Archer’s share price rose from a recent low of USD4.56 (July 27th) to USD6.73 in just five trad­ing days. The price has dipped since to USD5.63 (August 7th), but this has still offered investors a 20.5 per­cent gain over the past month.

Back­ground

Gen­er­al Hut­mach­er retired in 2018 from the U.S Army hav­ing served more than 40 years. He was an Army Spe­cial Oper­a­tions Avi­a­tor who com­mand­ed at every lev­el dur­ing his three tours with the 160th Spe­cial Oper­a­tions Avi­a­tion Reg­i­ment. His last active-duty assign­ment was the Direc­tor of Oper­a­tions in the U.S. Spe­cial Oper­a­tions Com­mand in Tam­pa, Flori­da.

Gen­er­al Clay Hut­mach­er

For more infor­ma­tion

https://www.archer.com/

(Top image: Rep­re­sen­ta­tives from the U.S. Marine Corps Vis­it Archer — Cred­it: Busi­ness Wire)