Ohio Submits eIPP Proposal to Help Solve Medical Transport Challenge Across Four-State Region

Ohio has sub­mit­ted a com­pre­hen­sive pro­pos­al to the Fed­er­al Avi­a­tion Administration’s Elec­tric Ver­ti­cal Take­off and Land­ing Inte­gra­tion Pilot Pro­gram (eIPP) that would deploy oper­a­tional air­craft with­in three months of approval to solve crit­i­cal med­ical trans­port chal­lenges across a four-state region.

The Ohio Depart­ment of Trans­porta­tion (ODOT), lead­ing a coali­tion that includes Job­sO­hio, BETA Tech­nolo­gies, Joby Avi­a­tion, NEOEx, and the states of Michi­gan, Indi­ana and Ken­tucky, is offer­ing the FAA a ready-to-launch pro­gram backed by more than $1.2 bil­lion in exist­ing AAM infra­struc­ture, cer­ti­fied pro­peller tech­nol­o­gy, and a proven mul­ti­state coor­di­na­tion frame­work.

The pro­pos­al direct­ly responds to the eIPP objec­tives out­lined in Pres­i­dent Trump’s Exec­u­tive Order 14307, Unleash­ing Amer­i­can Drone Dom­i­nance, by demon­strat­ing how advanced air mobil­i­ty can deliv­er imme­di­ate oper­a­tional ben­e­fits while estab­lish­ing scal­able stan­dards for nation­al deploy­ment.

Ohio’s pro­pos­al lever­ages cut­ting-edge avi­a­tion tech­nol­o­gy to cre­ate a faster, smarter, and more depend­able alter­na­tive to ground and char­ter trans­port – solv­ing a nation­al chal­lenge with a proven, scal­able mod­el. BETA’s elec­tric air­craft would deliv­er rou­tine and just-in-time med­ical car­go for DHL Sup­ply Chain between Indi­anapo­lis, Colum­bus and Akron.

Ohio Gov­er­nor Mike DeWine said: “Ohio has the most pow­er­ful avi­a­tion and aero­space ecosys­tem in the nation. Work­ing togeth­er, Ohio’s pro­pos­al will solve a nation­al health­care chal­lenge by using advanced air mobil­i­ty tech­nolo­gies to replace inef­fi­cient ground and char­ter trans­porta­tion with faster, more eco­nom­i­cal, and more reli­able rout­ing.”

Job­sO­hio Pres­i­dent and CEO J.P. Nau­seef, added: “JobsOhio’s mod­el for cross-sec­tor col­lab­o­ra­tion has attract­ed more than $1.2 bil­lion in aero­space invest­ment, land­ed trans­for­ma­tion­al man­u­fac­tur­ing projects like Joby and Anduril, and built the infra­struc­ture that makes Ohio an advanced air mobil­i­ty pow­er­house.

“This eIPP pro­pos­al show­cas­es how strate­gic part­ner­ships can deliv­er essen­tial life-sav­ing health­care needs and eco­nom­ic ben­e­fits while cement­ing Amer­i­can lead­er­ship in the indus­tries of today and tomor­row.” 

 Joby Avi­a­tion Pro­peller Man­u­fac­tur­ing in Ohio

Joby began man­u­fac­tur­ing pro­peller blades at its Day­ton, Ohio facil­i­ty, estab­lish­ing Day­ton as the company’s long-term hub for blade pro­duc­tion.

Joby’s pro­peller blades are cen­tral to the aircraft’s low acoustic pro­file and rep­re­sent a decade of com­plex engi­neer­ing, requir­ing advanced car­bon man­u­fac­tur­ing process­es and high­ly skilled workforce—both avail­able in Day­ton.

The pro­peller blade pro­duc­tion expands Joby’s in-house man­u­fac­tur­ing of crit­i­cal con­form­ing com­po­nents and links oper­a­tions between Cal­i­for­nia and Ohio to pre­pare for com­mer­cial ser­vice at scale.

Joby Avi­a­tion Dou­bling Man­u­fac­tur­ing Foot­print in Day­ton

• Joby acquired a sec­ond man­u­fac­tur­ing facil­i­ty in the Day­ton area for $61.5 mil­lion, more than dou­bling its Ohio man­u­fac­tur­ing foot­print and bring­ing total capac­i­ty to over 700,000 square feet
• The new facil­i­ty will sup­port Joby’s plans to dou­ble pro­duc­tion to four air­craft per month in 2027 while pro­vid­ing space for sig­nif­i­cant future growth. Oper­a­tions expect­ed to begin in 2026
• The facil­i­ty com­ple­ments Joby’s exist­ing pro­duc­tion facil­i­ties in Cal­i­for­nia and Ohio, with hir­ing under­way to sup­port round-the-clock man­u­fac­tur­ing oper­a­tions as Joby tran­si­tions from low-rate ini­tial pro­duc­tion to high-vol­ume man­u­fac­tur­ing

JoeBen Bevirt, founder and CEO of Joby Avi­a­tion, said: “Joby is proud to part­ner with the State of Ohio on its appli­ca­tion to lever­age our advanced air mobil­i­ty tech­nol­o­gy for life­sav­ing health­care logis­tics.

“The nation­al momen­tum cre­at­ed by the eIPP and glob­al demand for advanced air mobil­i­ty is exact­ly why we are dou­bling our U.S. man­u­fac­tur­ing capac­i­ty – sup­port­ed in part by our grow­ing Ohio team – to deliv­er real-world oper­a­tions that solve dai­ly trans­porta­tion chal­lenges for Amer­i­can com­mu­ni­ties.

“We thank Pres­i­dent Trump and Sec­re­tary Duffy for their vision­ary lead­er­ship in launch­ing this pro­gram, which ensures that Amer­i­can inge­nu­ity and man­u­fac­tur­ing define the next cen­tu­ry of flight. This is our moment to show that the future of trans­porta­tion is being built, cer­ti­fied, and oper­at­ed right here in the Unit­ed States.”

GE Aero­space Invest­ment in BETA Tech­nolo­gies

• GE Aero­space announced a strate­gic part­ner­ship and $300 mil­lion equi­ty invest­ment in BETA Tech­nolo­gies (sub­ject to reg­u­la­to­ry approval) to accel­er­ate hybrid elec­tric avi­a­tion devel­op­ment
• GE and BETA are co-devel­op­ing a hybrid elec­tric tur­bo­gen­er­a­tor for Advanced Air Mobil­i­ty appli­ca­tions, com­bin­ing GE’s tur­bine and cer­ti­fi­ca­tion exper­tise with BETA’s elec­tric gen­er­a­tor capa­bil­i­ties to enable longer-range VTOL air­craft

Kris­ten Costel­lo, Head of Gov­ern­ment and Reg­u­la­to­ry Affairs at BETA Tech­nolo­gies, said: “Crit­i­cal med­ical trans­port is what our air­craft was built to do. It increas­es reli­a­bil­i­ty while low­er­ing costs, which ulti­mate­ly trans­lates to greater access for impor­tant, time-sen­si­tive trans­port.

“Over the past few years, we have worked with part­ners across Ohio and Michi­gan to begin installing infra­struc­ture and prepar­ing for AAM oper­a­tions. The eIPP is a huge step for­ward, show­cas­ing how this tech­nol­o­gy can expand access and ben­e­fit com­mu­ni­ties.”

NEOEx’s hydro­gen hybrid uncrewed air­craft sys­tem (UAS) would make deliv­er­ies on short­er region­al legs between med­ical facil­i­ties in Ohio and Michi­gan. Joby will lever­age its advanced flight capa­bil­i­ties – includ­ing its Super­pi­lot™ autonomous flight tech­nol­o­gy – to sup­port long-dis­tance med­ical trans­port and work to address the region’s most crit­i­cal, time-sen­si­tive needs.

Ohio will test prac­ti­cal solu­tions for real-world pain points with this pro­gram, uti­liz­ing this new aer­i­al tech­nol­o­gy for high-impact use cas­es. Often, trans­port is time-sen­si­tive, which gives these nov­el air­craft an advan­tage as they can often take off and land in places tra­di­tion­al air­craft can­not, allow­ing them to avoid con­ges­tion and improve access.

Michi­gan, Indi­ana, and Ken­tucky are for­mal­ly sup­port­ing Ohio’s eIPP appli­ca­tion, under­scor­ing the impor­tance of a coor­di­nat­ed, mul­ti­state approach to AAM.

Pri­or­i­ty uses of the tech­nol­o­gy – car­go and med­ical trans­port – nat­u­ral­ly cross state lines, so region­al align­ment on stan­dards, oper­a­tions, and infra­struc­ture is key to enabling the safe inte­gra­tion of new types of air­craft across the Mid­west. In addi­tion to win­ning the sup­port of sig­nif­i­cant stake­hold­ers across both the pri­vate and pub­lic sec­tors, ODOT has also engaged key air­ports in all four states, who are eager to incor­po­rate these advanced vehi­cles into the Nation­al Air­space Sys­tem (NAS).

Jus­tine John­son, Michi­gan Chief Mobil­i­ty Offi­cer, said: “Com­merce and trans­porta­tion do not stop at state lines, and it’s essen­tial that we engage in this valu­able part­ner­ship and research. This col­lab­o­ra­tion is cru­cial as we work togeth­er to pro­pel our region to the fore­front of devel­op­ing emerg­ing tech­nolo­gies in trans­porta­tion. By align­ing our efforts, we can dri­ve inno­va­tion and fos­ter sus­tain­able mobil­i­ty solu­tions in the Mid­west.”

Lar­ry Krauter, chief exec­u­tive offi­cer, Cincinnati/Northern Ken­tucky Inter­na­tion­al Air­port (CVG), added: “We are eager to con­tin­ue the col­lab­o­ra­tion with all part­ners involved in this mul­ti-state pro­gram and we look for­ward to the oppor­tu­ni­ties pre­sent­ed from the pilot for fur­ther data col­lec­tion, infra­struc­ture readi­ness, and pol­i­cy devel­op­ment required for scal­a­bil­i­ty.”

If Ohio is select­ed for the FAA’s pilot pro­gram, flight demon­stra­tions would begin with­in three months of an agree­ment being put into place, and rou­tine oper­a­tions would con­tin­ue for three years.

Join eVTOL Insights and indus­try lead­ers at its North Amer­i­ca con­fer­ence in Ohio

eVTOL Insights will also be in Ohio for its North Amer­i­ca Con­fer­ence from April 29th to May 1st. The event will be held at the Nation­al Advanced Air Mobil­i­ty Cen­ter of Excel­lence (NAAMCE) near Spring­field and tick­ets are cur­rent­ly on sale.

A list of pre­lim­i­nary dis­cus­sion top­ics have already been revealed. Click here to read more infor­ma­tion and secure your spot.