Joby Aviation signs MoU with Abdul Latif Jameel to bring electric air taxis to Saudi Arabia

US-based elec­tric ver­ti­cal take-off and land­ing (eVTOL) man­u­fac­tur­er, Joby Avi­a­tion (Joby), has signed a Mem­o­ran­dum of Under­stand­ing (MoU) with Abdul Latif Jameel, a diver­si­fied Sau­di Ara­bi­an busi­ness net­work, to explore a poten­tial dis­tri­b­u­tion agree­ment for its elec­tric air­craft in the King­dom.

The agree­ment marks a step toward launch­ing Joby’s eVTOL air taxi ser­vices in Sau­di Ara­bia, with the poten­tial deliv­ery of up to 200 air­craft and asso­ci­at­ed ser­vices val­ued at approx­i­mate­ly $1 bil­lion in the com­ing years.

The announce­ment builds on broad­er efforts by the US and Sau­di gov­ern­ments to strength­en eco­nom­ic ties through inno­va­tion and sus­tain­able trans­porta­tion ini­tia­tives.

The alliance plans to explore local oppor­tu­ni­ties, includ­ing air­craft dis­tri­b­u­tion, sales, after­mar­ket ser­vices such as main­te­nance and pilot train­ing, and the estab­lish­ment of local air taxi oper­a­tions.

“This col­lab­o­ra­tion is about bring­ing America’s lead­er­ship in elec­tric air mobil­i­ty to the world,” said JoeBen Bevirt, Founder and CEO of Joby Avi­a­tion.

“Togeth­er with Abdul Latif Jameel, we’re not just imag­in­ing a clean­er, safer, more effi­cient future—we’re build­ing it. And there is no bet­ter part­ner to help unlock the extra­or­di­nary oppor­tu­ni­ty for air trav­el in the region.”

A Strategic Partnership Supporting Saudi Arabia’s Mobility Shift

Abdul Latif Jameel’s role in this col­lab­o­ra­tion will focus on lever­ag­ing its expan­sive pres­ence in Sau­di Ara­bia and its decades-long oper­a­tional expe­ri­ence to sup­port the poten­tial roll­out of Joby’s air taxi ser­vices.

The com­pa­ny, which is mark­ing 70 years of Toy­ota dis­tri­b­u­tion in the Kingdom—Toyota being a strate­gic investor in Joby—was also an investor in Joby’s Series C fund­ing round in 2020.

“Sau­di Ara­bia is tran­si­tion­ing toward a new era of mobility—one that is on-demand, shared, con­nect­ed, and sus­tain­able. eVTOL is an excit­ing and impor­tant com­po­nent of this,” said Has­san Jameel, Vice Chair­man, Sau­di Ara­bia, Abdul Latif Jameel.

“We are look­ing for­ward to col­lab­o­rat­ing with Joby to sup­port the trans­for­ma­tion of the Kingdom’s mobil­i­ty sec­tor.”

Joby’s elec­tric air­craft is designed to car­ry four pas­sen­gers with a pilot, reach­ing speeds of up to 200 mph while pro­duc­ing a frac­tion of the noise gen­er­at­ed by tra­di­tion­al heli­copters.

It has announced plans to begin car­ry­ing pas­sen­gers in Dubai by 2026, with Sau­di Ara­bia expect­ed to fol­low as part of the company’s glob­al expan­sion.

The col­lab­o­ra­tion is a sig­nif­i­cant step for­ward in Joby’s com­mer­cial strat­e­gy, which includes direct oper­a­tions in select mar­kets like the Unit­ed States, and part­ner­ships in oth­ers such as Japan and, poten­tial­ly, Sau­di Ara­bia.

Through this MoU, Joby and Abdul Latif Jameel aim to help accel­er­ate the Kingdom’s trans­for­ma­tion under Vision 2030, fos­ter­ing eco­nom­ic growth and gen­er­at­ing new employ­ment oppor­tu­ni­ties in the mobil­i­ty sec­tor.