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EHang’s Certified EH216‑S performs pilotless flight demonstrations in Guangzhou and Hefei

EHang’s cer­ti­fied EH216‑S pilot­less pas­sen­ger-car­ry­ing aer­i­al vehi­cles suc­cess­ful­ly com­plet­ed debut com­mer­cial flight demon­stra­tions in Guangzhou and Hefei at the end of last year, mark­ing anoth­er major step towards nor­mal­is­ing flights with EH216‑S for aer­i­al sight­see­ing.

Tak­ing place at the Jiu­long Lake Park in Guangzhou and Luo­gang Cen­tral Park in Hefei in Decem­ber 2023, the events attract­ed rep­re­sen­ta­tives from local gov­ern­ments, the Civ­il Avi­a­tion Admin­is­tra­tion of Chi­na (CAAC), var­i­ous enter­pris­es, media and cit­i­zens. Both regions are addi­tion­al demon­stra­tion cities select­ed for UAM oper­a­tions in strate­gic part­ner­ship with EHang, for estab­lish­ing a lead­ing pres­ence in the emerg­ing low-alti­tude econ­o­my indus­try.

EHang’s cer­ti­fied EH216‑S air­craft obtained the Stan­dard Air­wor­thi­ness Cer­tifi­cates issued by the CAAC in Octo­ber 2023. Sev­er­al gov­ern­ment offi­cials and cit­i­zens from Guangzhou and Hefei joined the first group of invit­ed pas­sen­gers to take a ride on the EH216‑S, and expe­ri­enced a ride above the city land­marks.

Huazhi Hu, Founder, Chair­man and CEO of EHang, said: “We are excit­ed that EHang con­tin­ues trail­blaz­ing in the glob­al emerg­ing UAM indus­try. From the world’s first-of-its-kind pilot­less pas­sen­ger-car­ry­ing aer­i­al vehi­cle sys­tem type cer­tifi­cate, our first deliv­ery with stan­dard air­wor­thi­ness cer­tifi­cate, to today’s debut com­mer­cial flight demon­stra­tions with cer­ti­fied EH216‑S air­craft in Guangzhou and Hefei, we are mak­ing steady progress towards com­mer­cial oper­a­tions, as planned.

“This rapid advance­ment has been bol­stered by the unwa­ver­ing sup­port of our part­ners, reg­u­la­tors and nation­al poli­cies focused on devel­op­ing Chi­na’s low-alti­tude econ­o­my, espe­cial­ly in UAM. We are con­fi­dent that our con­cert­ed efforts will ensure a smooth launch of com­mer­cial oper­a­tions for EH216‑S in these pio­neer­ing cities in the near future.”

The Luo­gang Cen­tral Park is des­ig­nat­ed by the Hefei gov­ern­ment as eVTOL air­craft oper­a­tion site for its Full-Space Unmanned Sys­tem Inte­grat­ed Appli­ca­tion Demon­stra­tion Project. Trans­formed from the for­mer Hefei Luo­gang Inter­na­tion­al Air­port, the Luo­gang Cen­tral Park is known as the world’s largest urban cen­tral park, cov­er­ing a total area of 12.7 square kilo­me­ters.

It hosts nat­ur­al land­scape, theme gar­dens, play­grounds, con­cert halls, restau­rants, apart­ments, and hotels, which has attract­ed 300,000 dai­ly vis­i­tors dur­ing hol­i­days. Abun­dant appli­ca­tion sce­nar­ios and mas­sive demands for aer­i­al sight­see­ing, tourism and region­al shut­tle ser­vices makes the Luo­gang Cen­tral Park an ide­al com­mer­cial oper­a­tion site for EH216‑S pilot­less pas­sen­ger-car­ry­ing eVTOL air­craft.

Fol­low­ing the first eVTOL flight route at Luo­gang Cen­ter Park, the Hefei gov­ern­ment plans to col­lab­o­rate with EHang to expand aer­i­al sight­see­ing flight routes and ser­vices to more scenic spots in Hefei, such as Swan Lake, among oth­ers.

Based on the strate­gic part­ner­ship agree­ment with EHang in Octo­ber this year, the Hefei Munic­i­pal Gov­ern­ment intends to facil­i­tate the pur­chase of at least 100 units of EH216 series pilot­less aer­i­al vehi­cles from EHang, and/or pro­vide financ­ing sup­port, amount­ing up to a total of US$100 mil­lion.

Quan Zhang, Stand­ing Com­mit­tee Mem­ber of Hefei Munic­i­pal Com­mit­tee and Exec­u­tive Vice May­or of Hefei, said: “The low-alti­tude econ­o­my is an emerg­ing indus­try as well as a new engine for eco­nom­ic growth. In recent years, Hefei has firm­ly grasped the nation­al pol­i­cy guid­ance, indus­tri­al devel­op­ment direc­tion, and tech­no­log­i­cal rev­o­lu­tion trend, and has suc­cess­ful­ly ranked into the first tier in this new sec­tor.

“EHang’s debut com­mer­cial flight demon­stra­tions mark a new chap­ter in the devel­op­ment his­to­ry of the pilot­less pas­sen­ger-car­ry­ing aer­i­al vehi­cle and the low-alti­tude econ­o­my. In the next step, we will join hands with key enter­pris­es like EHang to focus on appli­ca­tion sce­nar­ios, indus­tri­al coop­er­a­tion, and busi­ness mod­el inno­va­tion, and strive to build Hefei as a low-alti­tude city of inter­na­tion­al influ­ence.”

The first EH216‑S pas­sen­ger-car­ry­ing unmanned aer­i­al vehi­cle sys­tem has been suc­cess­ful­ly deliv­ered to ETON, an intel­li­gent avi­a­tion tech­nol­o­gy sub­sidiary of Guangzhou Devel­op­ment Dis­trict Com­mu­ni­ca­tions Invest­ment Group, and has been deployed at the Jiu­long Lake oper­a­tional site.

More oper­a­tion sites and flight routes for aer­i­al sight­see­ing and logis­tics are under devel­op­ment in Huang­pu dis­trict as well.

In addi­tion, Guangzhou Devel­op­ment Dis­trict Com­mu­ni­ca­tions Invest­ment Group and Guangzhou Indus­tri­al Invest­ment Cap­i­tal announced to joint­ly set up a Guangzhou Devel­op­ment Dis­trict Low-Alti­tude Indus­try Ven­ture Cap­i­tal Fund, with the tar­get fund size of RMB 10 bil­lion.

The low-alti­tude econ­o­my, empha­sised as one of the strate­gic emerg­ing indus­tries dur­ing the annu­al Cen­tral Eco­nom­ic Work Con­fer­ence recent­ly held in Chi­na, has gar­nered strong sup­port from many local gov­ern­ments.

It has been recog­nised as a promis­ing domain with strong poten­tial to become a sub­stan­tial dri­ver of the nation­al eco­nom­ic growth. Notably, Guangzhou and Hefei have been posi­tioned as piv­otal gate­ways for pro­pelling Chi­na’s emerg­ing low-alti­tude econ­o­my indus­try. F

avourable poli­cies with sub­si­dies have been con­stant­ly launched to pro­mote the low-alti­tude econ­o­my relat­ed enter­pris­es, indus­tri­al clus­ters, infra­struc­ture, R&D, pro­duc­tion, appli­ca­tions, oper­a­tions, ser­vices and cer­ti­fi­ca­tions.

Mr. Jie Chen, Stand­ing Com­mit­tee Mem­ber of Guangzhou Munic­i­pal Com­mit­tee, Exec­u­tive Vice May­or of Guangzhou, and Sec­re­tary of Huang­pu Dis­trict Com­mit­tee, added: “As a local brand in Guangzhou and the world’s lead­ing intel­li­gent autonomous aer­i­al vehi­cle tech­nol­o­gy com­pa­ny, EHang always adheres to inno­va­tion lead­er­ship and con­stant­ly explores the bound­aries of the sky.

“I believe that today’s debut com­mer­cial flight demon­stra­tion will great­ly boost con­fi­dence of the entire indus­try and lead its devel­op­ment onto the fast track.”

The Guangzhou Huang­pu dis­trict gov­ern­ment released the Detailed Rules for Imple­men­ta­tion of Mea­sures to Pro­mote the High-Qual­i­ty Devel­op­ment of the Low-Alti­tude Econ­o­my in Guangzhou Devel­op­ment Dis­trict (Huang­pu Dis­trict) at today’s event.

The gov­ern­ment sub­si­dies are up to RMB 30 mil­lion for eli­gi­ble low-alti­tude indus­tri­al projects. Guangzhou Huang­pu dis­trict is accel­er­at­ing the lay­out of the low-alti­tude econ­o­my indus­tri­al clus­ters with poten­tial val­ues of hun­dreds of bil­lions in RMB. It is fore­see­able that low-alti­tude econ­o­my will play a more impor­tant role in the future eco­nom­ic and social devel­op­ment of Guangzhou Huang­pu dis­trict.

At today’s event, Hefei gov­ern­ment launched the Action Plan for Low-Alti­tude Eco­nom­ic Devel­op­ment of Hefei (2023–2025) with 20 guide­lines. It is pro­posed to build a low-alti­tude econ­o­my clus­ter, build a test­ing and air­wor­thi­ness cer­ti­fi­ca­tion base, build a flight ser­vice and man­age­ment plat­form, set up com­mer­cial flight routes for aer­i­al tourism and logis­tics.

Pic­ture cred­it: EHang

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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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