Joby Aviation generates first revenue and takes key step towards launching first commercial passenger flights in 2024

Joby Avi­a­tion is anoth­er step clos­er to deliv­er­ing com­mer­cial pas­sen­ger flights in 2024, after announc­ing it has gen­er­at­ed rev­enue as part of achiev­ing anoth­er major mile­stone in the U.S. Air Force’s Agili­ty Prime pro­gramme.

The Cal­i­for­nia-based com­pa­ny has also said it agreed to a ‘G1’ cer­ti­fi­ca­tion basis for its eVTOL air­craft with the Fed­er­al Avi­a­tion Admin­is­tra­tion (FAA) in 2020. A ‘G1’ out­lines the cri­te­ria that need to be met in order for an air­craft to be cer­ti­fied for civ­il com­mer­cial oper­a­tions, and the news marks a key step on the way towards cer­ti­fy­ing any new air­craft in the USA.

Joby’s air­craft will be cer­ti­fied in line with the FAA’s exist­ing Part 23 require­ments for Nor­mal Cat­e­go­ry Air­planes, with spe­cial con­di­tions intro­duced to address spe­cif­ic require­ments. These spe­cial con­di­tions, defined in the ‘G1’ doc­u­ment, are expect­ed to be pub­lished in the US Fed­er­al Reg­is­ter in the com­ing months.

JoeBen Bevirt, Founder and CEO of Joby Avi­a­tion — and who is also recog­nised in the first eVTOL Insights Pow­er Book, said: “While we still have sev­er­al years of air­craft test­ing ahead of us, we now have a clear­ly defined, and achiev­able, path to cer­ti­fy­ing our air­craft and intro­duc­ing cus­tomer flights.

“Reach­ing this mile­stone is a water­shed moment for our new indus­try and I’m tremen­dous­ly grate­ful for the many years of hard work the FAA and our in-house avi­a­tion safe­ty experts have put into get­ting us to this point.”

Joby’s par­tic­i­pa­tion in the Agili­ty Prime pro­gramme will also pro­vide the US Gov­ern­ment with valu­able data and insight into the oper­a­tion and per­for­mance of eVTOL air­craft.

It also pro­vides Joby with access to key research facil­i­ties and equip­ment, as well as an oppor­tu­ni­ty to prove out the matu­ri­ty and reli­a­bil­i­ty of its air­craft years in advance of enter­ing com­mer­cial ser­vice.

The news of Joby gen­er­at­ing rev­enue from the pro­gramme comes on the heels of the com­pa­ny being award­ed the Air Force’s first-ever air­wor­thi­ness approval for an eVTOL vehi­cle at the end of 2020. Joby’s zero emis­sions air­craft, which can trans­port four pas­sen­gers and a pilot, can fly up to 150 miles on a sin­gle charge and can cruise at 200 mph.

Bevirt added: “The Agili­ty Prime pro­gramme rep­re­sents an invalu­able oppor­tu­ni­ty to under­stand and accel­er­ate the pos­i­tive impact of clean, elec­tric air­craft in the US and beyond.

“With ten years of engi­neer­ing and more than a 1000 test flights behind us, we’re excit­ed to now be play­ing a key role in demon­strat­ing the poten­tial of this new sec­tor while giv­ing the US Gov­ern­ment a front row seat.”

Nathan P. Diller, AFWERX Agili­ty Prime Direc­tor, said: “The Agili­ty Prime and Joby part­ner­ship is now on an accel­er­at­ed path to iden­ti­fy the oppor­tu­ni­ties for ear­ly adop­tion of these air­craft for logis­tics that pro­vide flex­i­bil­i­ty to oper­a­tors and sav­ings to tax­pay­ers. We are also one step clos­er to the com­mer­cial­i­sa­tion of a clean, qui­et, mod­ern, trans­porta­tion sys­tem.”