Lilium receives Design Organisation Approval from EASA in latest milestone on its company roadmap

Lil­i­um has announced today (Mon­day) that it has received Design Orga­ni­za­tion Approval (DOA) from the Euro­pean Union Avi­a­tion Safe­ty Agency (EASA).

The award estab­lish­es the com­pa­ny as qual­i­fied to design and hold a type cer­tifi­cate for air­craft devel­oped accord­ing to EASA’s SC-VTOL rules.

This major achieve­ment in the devel­op­ment of the Lil­i­um Jet reflects the cul­mi­na­tion of an exten­sive qual­i­fi­ca­tion process which dates back to 2017.

Klaus Roewe, Lil­i­um CEO, com­ment­ed: “In many respects, today’s announce­ment marks a cor­ner­stone for Lil­i­um and evi­dences our mar­ket lead­er­ship in advanc­ing the avi­a­tion indus­try. Achiev­ing Design Orga­ni­za­tion Approval reflects EASA’s con­fi­dence in Lil­i­um and dif­fer­en­ti­ates us against oth­ers cur­rent­ly pur­su­ing eVTOL devel­op­ment and reg­u­la­to­ry approval.

“While we join a small, select group of com­pa­nies qual­i­fied to devel­op com­mer­cial air­craft, today’s announce­ment is espe­cial­ly sig­nif­i­cant for the glob­al avi­a­tion indus­try as we are doing so by advanc­ing sus­tain­able region­al air mobil­i­ty.”

Design Orga­ni­za­tion Approval is a core require­ment for any com­mer­cial air­craft devel­op­ment com­pa­ny, con­firm­ing that Lilium’s organ­i­sa­tion, pro­ce­dures and capa­bil­i­ties meet the strin­gent safe­ty and reg­u­la­to­ry stan­dards for the devel­op­ment of Part-21 com­mer­cial air­craft.

The com­pa­ny is pur­su­ing con­cur­rent type-cer­tifi­cate val­i­da­tion of the Lil­i­um Jet with the Fed­er­al Avi­a­tion Admin­is­tra­tion (FAA), under the pro­vi­sions of the Bilat­er­al Avi­a­tion Safe­ty Agree­ment between the Euro­pean Union and the USA.

The FAA issued its G‑1 for the Lil­i­um Jet in June, mak­ing Lil­i­um the only eVTOL man­u­fac­tur­er with both an EASA and FAA cer­ti­fi­ca­tion basis for a pow­ered lift eVTOL air­craft.

Alas­tair McIn­tosh, Lil­i­um Chief Tech­nol­o­gy Offi­cer and Head of Design Organ­i­sa­tion, said “In sim­ple terms, the Design Orga­ni­za­tion Approval is our Licence to Oper­ate and con­firms that Lil­i­um has the orga­ni­za­tion, pro­ce­dures, com­pe­ten­cies, resources, and demon­strat­ed rig­or required to design and cer­ti­fy air­craft accord­ing to the very high­est safe­ty stan­dards.

“This pays great trib­ute to our team at Lil­i­um. Receiv­ing Design Orga­ni­za­tion Approval from EASA fur­ther moti­vates us on our path to com­mer­cial­ize the rev­o­lu­tion­ary Lil­i­um Jet.”

Luc Tyt­gat, Act­ing Exec­u­tive Direc­tor at EASA, added: “EASA is ensur­ing that every­thing is in place for the soci­etal accep­tance of Urban Air Mobil­i­ty. We are set­ting the right rules for oper­a­tions and tak­ing care of the envi­ron­men­tal ele­ments includ­ing noise, while of course ensur­ing that high safe­ty stan­dards are met.

“At the same time, we are wary of cre­at­ing bar­ri­ers to enter­ing this new mar­ket and we have worked in part­ner­ship with Lil­i­um, against a demand­ing time­line. I would like to con­grat­u­late Lil­i­um on achiev­ing this Design Orga­ni­za­tion Approval, which advances Europe’s elec­tric avi­a­tion activ­i­ty.”