Joby Selects Dayton, Ohio for first scaled manufacturing facility

Joby Avi­a­tion announced today its plans to locate its first scaled air­craft pro­duc­tion facil­i­ty in Day­ton, Ohio, home to Wright-Pat­ter­son Air Force Base, and the head­quar­ters of the US Air Force Research Lab­o­ra­to­ries.

Joby plans to build a facil­i­ty capa­ble of deliv­er­ing up to 500 air­craft per year and sup­port­ing up to 2,000 jobs. The 140-acre site pro­vides enough land to build up to two mil­lion square feet of man­u­fac­tur­ing space.

Con­struc­tion is expect­ed to start in 2024 and to come online in 2025. The State of Ohio, Job­sO­hio and local polit­i­cal sub­di­vi­sions have offered incen­tives and ben­e­fits of up to $325 mil­lion to sup­port the devel­op­ment of the facil­i­ty, while Joby plans to invest up to $500 mil­lion as it scales oper­a­tions at the site.

Joby is also announc­ing today that it has been invit­ed by the US Depart­ment of Ener­gy to sub­mit a Part II Appli­ca­tion for financ­ing under the Title XVII Loan Guar­an­tee Pro­gram, which pro­vides access to low-inter­est loans for clean ener­gy projects and would sup­port the scal­ing of the facil­i­ty.

Joby’s long-term investor, Toy­ota, who worked with Joby on the design and suc­cess­ful launch of the company’s Pilot Pro­duc­tion Line in Mari­na, Cal­i­for­nia, plans to con­tin­ue to advise Joby as it pre­pares for scaled pro­duc­tion of its com­mer­cial pas­sen­ger air taxi in Ohio.

Joby founder and CEO JoeBen Bevirt said: “The US con­tin­ues to lead the way with unprece­dent­ed lev­els of sup­port across all areas and lev­els of gov­ern­ment. We are grate­ful to Gov­er­nor Mike DeWine, Lieu­tenant Gov­er­nor Jon Husted, Sen­a­tor Sher­rod Brown, Sen­a­tor JD Vance, Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Mike Turn­er, and the team at Job­sO­hio for their sup­port.”

Joby plans to start hir­ing in the com­ing months, with ear­ly roles expect­ed to focus on the machin­ing of parts that will ini­tial­ly be incor­po­rat­ed into Joby’s Cal­i­for­nia low-vol­ume pro­duc­tion line. Joby’s pro­duc­tion air­craft is designed to trans­port a pilot and four pas­sen­gers at speeds of up to 200 mph, with a max­i­mum range of 100 miles and a qui­et noise pro­file that is bare­ly audi­ble against the back­drop of cities. The com­pa­ny plans to build on part­ner­ships it has devel­oped with Delta and Uber. Joby’s head­quar­ters, research and devel­op­ment, and pilot pro­duc­tion facil­i­ty will remain in Cal­i­for­nia.

Gov­er­nor Mike DeWine con­tin­ued: “We wel­come Joby and cel­e­brate the new chap­ter of air mobil­i­ty his­to­ry that will be made in Ohio, the Heart of Avi­a­tion.”

Lieu­tenant Gov­er­nor Jon Husted added: “Today’s announce­ment was earned through 20 years of strate­gic plan­ning in the Day­ton region, lead­ing us to be in the best pos­si­ble posi­tion for a com­pa­ny like Joby to expand their oper­a­tions from Cal­i­for­nia to Ohio. For over 100 years, that inno­va­tion has not been suc­cess­ful­ly trans­lat­ed into the man­u­fac­tur­ing of air­craft and jobs that come with it. Today, that elu­sive aspi­ra­tion becomes real­i­ty.”

Sen­a­tor Sher­rod Brown con­clud­ed: “Joby Avi­a­tion under­stands Ohio’s proud his­to­ry of lead­er­ship in aero­space inno­va­tion and that is why I fought to ensure that they invest­ed here.”