SkyDrive Signs R&D Memorandum with Six Singapore Technology Companies

Japan­ese eVTOL devel­op­er Sky­Drive has signed a mem­o­ran­dum of under­stand­ing (MOU) with six Sin­ga­pore-based tech­nol­o­gy com­pa­nies to explore joint research, devel­op­ment and tech­ni­cal val­i­da­tion of com­po­nents and sys­tems for elec­tric ver­ti­cal take-off and land­ing air­craft.

The agree­ment was announced on 29 Octo­ber at the Sin­ga­pore Week of Inno­va­tion & Tech­nol­o­gy (SWITCH). The part­ners are Accuron Tech­nolo­gies, Heron Air­bridge, HOPE Tech­nik, KVI, Neo Aero­nau­tics and Volt14 Solu­tions. The MOU estab­lish­es a frame­work for tech­ni­cal col­lab­o­ra­tion, with the par­ties expect­ed to work towards more detailed agree­ments cov­er­ing spe­cif­ic research projects and fea­si­bil­i­ty stud­ies.

The pro­posed work spans air­craft man­u­fac­tur­ing, bat­tery tech­nol­o­gy, rapid pro­to­typ­ing, flight oper­a­tions man­age­ment and reg­u­la­to­ry coor­di­na­tion.

Accuron Tech­nolo­gies will explore the use of met­al addi­tive man­u­fac­tur­ing to pro­duce com­plex, light­weight aero­space com­po­nents. Heron Air­bridge will sup­port tech­ni­cal val­i­da­tion of sys­tems for real-time air­space mon­i­tor­ing and traf­fic man­age­ment, while HOPE Tech­nik will con­tribute its rapid pro­to­typ­ing capa­bil­i­ties to help man­u­fac­ture and test exper­i­men­tal com­po­nents and air­craft.

Bat­tery devel­op­ment forms anoth­er part of the pro­gramme. KVI will eval­u­ate soft­ware designed to con­trol charg­ing at bat­tery-cell and pack lev­el, with the aim of improv­ing charg­ing speed and bat­tery lifes­pan. Volt14 Solu­tions will work on high-capac­i­ty bat­tery cells using sil­i­con-based mate­ri­als and assess light­weight bat­tery-pack designs intend­ed for eVTOL appli­ca­tions.

Neo Aero­nau­tics will explore poten­tial coop­er­a­tion on oper­a­tional test­ing, reg­u­la­to­ry cer­ti­fi­ca­tion frame­works, flight-test infra­struc­ture and region­al busi­ness devel­op­ment.

Sky­Drive said the col­lab­o­ra­tion is intend­ed to sup­port its air­craft devel­op­ment and com­mer­cial­i­sa­tion efforts in Japan while build­ing tech­ni­cal capa­bil­i­ties for inter­na­tion­al mar­kets. Sin­ga­pore’s aero­space, elec­tron­ics and advanced-man­u­fac­tur­ing sec­tors make it a poten­tial base for devel­op­ing and val­i­dat­ing tech­nolo­gies rel­e­vant to future air mobil­i­ty oper­a­tions in South­east Asia.

The announce­ment does not estab­lish a con­firmed pro­duc­tion pro­gramme or com­mer­cial oper­at­ing plan in Sin­ga­pore. Sky­Drive said the part­ners would ini­tial­ly focus on tech­ni­cal exchanges, infor­ma­tion shar­ing and eval­u­at­ing pos­si­ble research activ­i­ties.

Thomas Sleightholm

Thomas is a con­tent writer for eVTOL Insights, cov­er­ing all aspects of the glob­al Advanced Air Mobil­i­ty ecosys­tem. Got a sto­ry for him? Please send an email to editorial@evtolinsights.com

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