Beta ALIA the “Next Gen Aircraft for Air New Zealand” 

Air New Zealand (ANZ) announced this week that Beta’s bat­tery-pow­ered, all-elec­tric con­ven­tion­al take-off and land­ing (CTOL) ALIA air­craft, designed by Beta Tech­nolo­gies, will be the Airline’s first pur­chase for its ‘Mis­sion Next Gen Air­craft Pro­gram,’ reports a press release. It is expect­ed to join the ANZ fleet in 2026. 

The announce­ment fol­lows an 18-month peri­od of eval­u­a­tion. Through the airline’s Next Gen Air­craft Pro­gram, after look­ing at 30 dif­fer­ent organ­i­sa­tions, Air New Zealand has select­ed four part­ners to work close­ly with on its goal of launch­ing com­mer­cial flights using next gen­er­a­tion air­craft. Beta’s ALIA is the Airline’s first com­mer­cial order in the pro­gram. 

ANZ will ini­tial­ly oper­ate the air­craft as a car­go-only ser­vice in col­lab­o­ra­tion with New Zealand Post, on a route present­ly being select­ed across Aotearoa.

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Greg Foran, CEO of ANZ com­ment­ed, “This is a small but impor­tant first step in a much larg­er jour­ney for the air­line. There is a lot of work ahead of us, but we are incred­i­bly com­mit­ted, and this pur­chase marks a new chap­ter for the air­line.” 

He con­tin­ued, “While the air­craft will add to, not replace our exist­ing fleet, it is a cat­a­lyst for change. By fly­ing the ALIA, we hope to advance our knowl­edge and the trans­for­ma­tion need­ed in the avi­a­tion sys­tem in Aotearoa for us to fly larg­er, fleet replac­ing, next gen­er­a­tion air­craft from 2030.” 

Kyle Clark, CEO of Beta, added, “We are grat­i­fied by the airline’s con­fi­dence in our tech­nol­o­gy as a solu­tion that will meet their oper­a­tional needs and look for­ward to con­tin­u­ing to work hand-in-hand as we bring the ALIA to mar­ket for 2026.”

At present, ANZ has a firm order for one ALIA air­craft with options for an addi­tion­al two along­side rights for a fur­ther 20. Giv­en the short­er length of the flights Air New Zealand intends to oper­ate, it will like­ly fly the ALIA at a low­er alti­tude of between 1,500 to 3,000 metres.

The CTOL air­craft weighs three tons, is just over 12 metres long, and can fly at speeds of up to 270kms an hour. A full bat­tery charge is antic­i­pat­ed to take between 40–60 min­utes. The air­craft has flown over 480 kms in one flight test. For ANZ’s ini­tial flights, it is look­ing at routes of around 150kms in length. An announce­ment will be made ear­ly next year, unveil­ing the two fron­trun­ner air­ports for the Mis­sion Next Gen Air­craft Pro­gram.

Left to right: Kiri Han­nifin, Air New Zealand Sus­tain­abil­i­ty Offi­cer; Greg Foran ANZ CEO; Kyle Clark, Beta CEO; David Mor­gan, ANZ Chief Oper­a­tional Integri­ty and Safe­ty Offi­cer; Steve Smyth, Civ­il Avi­a­tion Author­i­ty Direc­tor of Emerg­ing Tech­nolo­gies Pro­gram: Cred­it — Air New Zealand)

For more infor­ma­tion

https://www.beta/team

https://www.airnewzealand.co.uk

(Top image: Beta Tech­nolo­gies)