Joby, Virgin Atlantic “Announce Collaboration for Future UK Electric Air Taxi Service”

Joby Avi­a­tion has recent­ly announced a col­lab­o­ra­tion with Vir­gin Atlantic, to launch the U.S eVTOL company’s air taxi ser­vice in the UK, reports a press release.

The part­ner­ship builds on an exist­ing agree­ment between Joby and Delta Air Lines, which owns a 49 per­cent stake in Vir­gin Atlantic, to launch ser­vices in the U.S and UK, unit­ing the brands com­mit­ted to inno­va­tion, cus­tomer ser­vice and chal­leng­ing the sta­tus quo.

The release explains, “The col­lab­o­ra­tion aims to offer seam­less, zero-emis­sion, short-range jour­neys across the UK, start­ing with region­al and city con­nec­tions from Vir­gin Atlantic’s hubs at Heathrow and Man­ches­ter Air­port. Vir­gin will sup­port Joby’s go-to-mar­ket efforts in the UK through mar­ket­ing the ser­vice to their cus­tomers, engag­ing reg­u­la­tors along­side Joby and help­ing to build sup­port for the devel­op­ment of land­ing infra­struc­ture at key air­ports.”

JoeBen Bevirt, Founder and CEO of Joby, com­ment­ed, “Togeth­er, we are com­mit­ted to deliv­er­ing faster options for mobil­i­ty across the coun­try, includ­ing for Vir­gin Atlantic and Delta cus­tomers as they head to the air­port or move between UK towns and cities.” Adding, “We couldn’t imag­ine a bet­ter part­ner to work with in the UK.”

Shai Weiss, CEO of Vir­gin Atlantic, remarked, “As a leader in sus­tain­abil­i­ty and with inno­va­tion firm­ly in our DNA, we are delight­ed to be part­ner­ing with Joby to bring short-haul, zero-emis­sion flight to air­ports and cities through­out the UK. Our strate­gic part­ner­ship com­bines Joby’s exper­tise in design, engi­neer­ing and tech­nol­o­gy with the pow­er of Vir­gin Atlantic’s brand and award-win­ning cus­tomer expe­ri­ence.”

The release con­tin­ues, “Jour­neys in the UK could include a 15-minute flight from Man­ches­ter Air­port to Leeds, or an 8‑minute jour­ney from Heathrow Air­port to Canary Wharf, instead of 80 min­utes by car. Over time, Joby expects to build out a net­work of land­ing loca­tions that offer rapid and con­ve­nient trav­el around cities and com­mu­ni­ties through­out the UK. Joby expects to offer prices that are com­pa­ra­ble with exist­ing pre­mi­um ground ride-shar­ing options at launch.”

Shai Weiss, JoeBen Bevirt

In 2022, Joby and Delta Air Lines announced a mul­ti-city, com­mer­cial and oper­a­tional part­ner­ship to pio­neer com­mu­ni­ty-to-air­port trans­porta­tion for cus­tomers. While the Joby/Delta part­ner­ship is mutu­al­ly exclu­sive across the U.S and UK for at least five years fol­low­ing com­mer­cial launch, the part­ner­ship has been extend­ed to include Vir­gin Atlantic in the UK.

Back­ground

Vir­gin Atlantic has been pio­neer­ing sus­tain­abil­i­ty lead­er­ship for more than 15 years, com­mit­ting to Net Zero by 2050 and con­tin­u­ous action that reduces envi­ron­men­tal impact.  In Novem­ber 2023, the air­line led a con­sor­tium to deliv­er the world’s first flight across the Atlantic on 100 per­cent Sus­tain­able Avi­a­tion Fuel (SAF), demon­strat­ing that SAF can be used safe­ly in exist­ing infra­struc­ture, engines and air­frames.

For more infor­ma­tion

www.jobyaviation.com

www.virginatlantic.com

(Images: Joby Avi­a­tion)

For the lat­est news, insights and con­tent regard­ing the glob­al Advanced Air Mobil­i­ty mar­ket, please join the fol­low­ing eVTOL Insights chan­nels: What­sApp, Face­book, Insta­gram, Spo­ti­fy, Apple Pod­casts, YouTube, X and LinkedIn.