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Lilium Announces “Purchase of 20 Lilium Jets” from U.S Operator UrbanLink

Lil­i­um announced this week a part­ner­ship with Advanced Air Mobil­i­ty (AAM) oper­a­tor, Urban­Link, to oper­ate as well as pur­chase 20 Lil­i­um Jets in South Flori­da, reports a press report. The deal includes pre-deliv­ery pay­ment sched­ules. 

The Flori­da-based com­pa­ny is to become “the first air­line in the U.S ful­ly com­mit­ted to inte­grat­ing eVTOL air­craft into its fleet.”

Recent­ly launched, Urban­Link is led by Ed Wegel, an expe­ri­enced air­line exec­u­tive with 40 years in financ­ing, oper­a­tions and dis­tri­b­u­tion. He has raised more than USD1 bil­lion for avi­a­tion ven­tures and led FAA cer­ti­fi­ca­tions for two U.S Part 135 air­lines and sev­er­al Part 121 car­ri­ers, includ­ing achiev­ing the 2014 cer­ti­fi­ca­tion of East­ern Air Lines’ 737–800 fleet in a record-break­ing eight months. 

Most recent­ly, Wegel served as CEO and Founder of Glob­alX, America’s fastest-grow­ing char­ter air­line. He has also served as a board mem­ber for pri­vate and pub­lic avi­a­tion com­pa­nies includ­ing Atlantic Coast, BWIA Inter­na­tion­al and East­ern Air­lines. Wegel was also a key devel­op­er of JetBlue’s ini­tial busi­ness plan.

He com­ment­ed, “While many air­lines have dis­cussed the poten­tial of oper­at­ing eVTOL air­craft, none have made a defin­i­tive com­mit­ment. Urban­Link will be the first air­line in the U.S. to inte­grate eVTOL air­craft into its fleet.” 

He con­tin­ued, “We are ded­i­cat­ed to rev­o­lu­tion­is­ing the way peo­ple move to and from as well as with­in urban cores. After thor­ough eval­u­a­tion of var­i­ous man­u­fac­tur­ers, we found the Lil­i­um Jet to be the opti­mal choice for our needs, thanks to its supe­ri­or cab­in design, range, capac­i­ty and cost-effec­tive­ness.”

Ed Wegel

This col­lab­o­ra­tion marks a crit­i­cal mile­stone in accel­er­at­ing the adop­tion of AAM in South Flori­da. UrbanLink’s entry into the region include aims to utilise the planned net­work of Flori­da ver­ti­ports that Lil­i­um and its part­ners have for­mu­lat­ed dur­ing the past five years.

The release explains, “Urban­Link views eVTOLs as a key dri­ver of sus­tain­able region­al con­nec­tiv­i­ty across South Flori­da. The Lil­i­um Jet, with its planned launch range, is poised to ful­fil this vision by link­ing major cities such as Mia­mi, West Palm Beach, Boca Raton and Fort Laud­erdale, extend­ing seam­less­ly across the penin­su­la to Mar­co Island. The ser­vice launch is tar­get­ed for 2026.”

Sebastien Borel, Lilium’s CCO remarked, “This is a huge mile­stone, not only for Lil­i­um, but for the com­mer­cial­i­sa­tion of eVTOLs in the U.S. We believe this pur­chase of our eVTOL air­craft is the first by a com­mer­cial oper­a­tor that isn’t invest­ed in the man­u­fac­tur­er that it is pur­chas­ing from.” 

He added, “This is a sign that the mar­ket for eVTOLs has matured and there is grow­ing demand for air­craft that can pro­vide con­nec­tions between, rather than just with­in, cities.” 

The pur­chase order fol­lows the begin­ning of the first Lil­i­um Jet assem­bly at the end of last year with the ini­tial pilot­ed flight test of the eVTOL air­craft tar­get­ed for late 2024. 

For more infor­ma­tion

www.lilium.com

urbanlinkair.com

(Images: Lil­i­um)

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