SkyDrive CEO Tomohiro Fukuzawa Shares Exciting Update of Company’s Continued Industry Progress

Japan­ese eVTOL OEM Sky­Drive has released a mes­sage from its founder and CEO Tomo­hi­ro Fukuza­wa, as he shares three impor­tant updates which pro­vide a unique look at how the com­pa­ny is scal­ing its tech­nol­o­gy and busi­ness in 2026:

Sky­Drive con­tin­ues to make sol­id progress this year, after an excit­ing 2025 where Fukuza­wa talked in more detail on a recent eVTOL Insights Pod­cast

–/

Sol­id Progress in Q1 2026 and Accel­er­a­tion as a Nation­al Strat­e­gy

In the first quar­ter (Q1) of 2026, Sky­Drive has moved for­ward at an unprece­dent­ed pace toward its vision of ‘bring­ing the air mobil­i­ty rev­o­lu­tion to dai­ly life.’ The com­pa­ny has report­ed the key mile­stones have been achieved dur­ing this peri­od:

1. A Major Leap Toward Prac­ti­cal Appli­ca­tion: Suc­cess of the “Tokyo Demo Flight”

The demo flight con­duct­ed in the Tokyo Bay area in Feb­ru­ary cap­tured sig­nif­i­cant atten­tion both domes­ti­cal­ly and inter­na­tion­al­ly. 

In col­lab­o­ra­tion with the Tokyo Met­ro­pol­i­tan Gov­ern­ment, Mit­subishi Estate, and Kane­mat­su, we suc­cess­ful­ly con­duct­ed Japan’s first ver­i­fi­ca­tion focused on ‘actu­al oper­a­tions’, such as the automa­tion and opti­miza­tion of ver­ti­port man­age­ment, going beyond a mere flight demon­stra­tion.

This achieve­ment was report­ed by media out­lets world­wide, pro­vid­ing a con­crete vision of a future where eVTOL air­craft are inte­grat­ed into the urban land­scape.

.2. Estab­lish­ing Sta­tus as a Nation­al Strat­e­gy and Accel­er­at­ing Pub­lic-Pri­vate Col­lab­o­ra­tion

eVTOLs (“Fly­ing Car” to be called in Japan)  have been offi­cial­ly select­ed as a key prod­uct and tech­nol­o­gy with­in one of the 17 Pri­or­i­ty Fields of the Japan­ese Government’s Growth Strat­e­gy.

This sig­ni­fies that our chal­lenge is rec­og­nized not mere­ly as a pri­vate ven­ture, but as a core pil­lar of a nation­al strat­e­gy dri­ving Japan’s next gen­er­a­tion.

Fur­ther­more, with the Cabinet’s deci­sion to posi­tion eVTOLs as sus­tain­able infra­struc­ture for region­al revi­tal­iza­tion and the shared vision at the Osa­ka Round­table to oper­ate “100 air­craft by 2035,” the roadmap for pub­lic-pri­vate inte­gra­tion is accel­er­at­ing.

As a fron­trun­ner in this indus­try, Sky­Drive will con­tin­ue to lead both reg­u­la­to­ry design and social imple­men­ta­tion.

3. Break­through in the Type Cer­ti­fi­ca­tion Process

In our ongo­ing efforts to obtain Type Cer­ti­fi­ca­tion in Japan (JCAB) and the U.S., we reached an agree­ment with the Min­istry of Land, Infra­struc­ture, Trans­port and Tourism (MLIT) on the Gen­er­al Cer­ti­fi­ca­tion Plan (GCP) this quar­ter.

This agree­ment estab­lish­es a defin­i­tive path toward cer­ti­fi­ca­tion and sig­nif­i­cant­ly reduces devel­op­ment risks. This progress with­in the Japan­ese reg­u­la­to­ry frame­work also serves as a pos­i­tive cat­a­lyst for our cer­ti­fi­ca­tion process in the Unit­ed States.

4. Con­tin­u­ous Expan­sion of the Glob­al Ecosys­tem

Our glob­al expan­sion is gain­ing momen­tum. The com­pa­ny has made steady progress in Mid­dle East­ern and Asian mar­kets, advanc­ing air­craft pur­chase agree­ments with AeroGulf Ser­vices (Dubai) and 7A Drones (Tai­wan), while solid­i­fy­ing our foun­da­tion in North Amer­i­ca through our part­ner­ship with Aeroau­to.

Notably, the for­mu­la­tion of an emer­gency med­ical trans­porta­tion route between remote islands in Tai­wan exem­pli­fies the pro­found social value—saving lives—that our air­craft pro­vides.

From a “Vision­ary Con­cept” to a “Real-World Indus­try”

The activ­i­ties of Q1 clear­ly demon­strate that eVTOLs are no longer a “imag­i­nate vehi­cle of the future” but are evolv­ing into a viable, real-world indus­try.

By expand­ing the options for aer­i­al mobil­i­ty, we can make dai­ly life more con­ve­nient and enjoy­able while alle­vi­at­ing social issues such as urban traf­fic con­ges­tion and pro­vid­ing sup­port for emer­gency med­ical ser­vices. A key fea­ture of SkyDrive’s mul­ti­ro­tor eVTOL is that it does not require a run­way for take­off and land­ing, mak­ing it easy to install ver­ti­ports with­in our dai­ly liv­ing spaces, such as city cen­ters.

When seam­less aer­i­al trav­el becomes avail­able right from your home or office, it will not only save time but also trans­form trav­el into an enjoy­able expe­ri­ence.

To real­ize this future, the under­stand­ing and coop­er­a­tion of stake­hold­ers worldwide—including gov­ern­ments, munic­i­pal­i­ties, glob­al busi­ness part­ners, and our future users—are indis­pens­able. This glob­al net­work is the key to cre­at­ing a world where eVTOLs are a nat­ur­al part of every­day life.