SkyDrive wins Japanese Government 12.4 Billion Yen innovation grant

Sky­Drive has been cho­sen by the Japan­ese Min­istry of Econ­o­my, Trade and Indus­try for the ‘Next-gen­er­a­tion Air Mobil­i­ty Field’ of the Small and Medi­um Enter­prise Inno­va­tion Pro­mo­tion Project SBIR Phase 3.

Sky­Drive has been grant­ed 12.4 bil­lion yen, or approx­i­mate­ly $82 mil­lion, to sup­port the devel­op­ment of inno­v­a­tive tech­nolo­gies aimed at enhanc­ing future social imple­men­ta­tion, includ­ing reduc­ing traf­fic con­ges­tion and low­er emis­sions.

The SBIR pro­gram is a Japan­ese gov­ern­ment ini­tia­tive to grant start­up com­pa­nies work­ing on advanced tech­nolo­gies that address soci­etal chal­lenges. The pro­gram sup­ports research and devel­op­ment projects that have high poten­tial for growth and pos­i­tive impact on soci­ety.

Sky­Drive is devel­op­ing a mul­ti­copter-type eVTOL air­craft with two pas­sen­gers and a pilot. The air­craft has a max­i­mum take­off weight of less than 1.5 tons and is designed to be safe, qui­et, and envi­ron­men­tal­ly friend­ly.

There are approx­i­mate­ly 10 eVTOL com­pa­nies, includ­ing Sky­Drive, that have begun a type cer­ti­fi­ca­tion process for their eVTOLs present­ly. It fea­tures a unique patent pend­ing rotor frame tech­nol­o­gy that allows it to land on rooftops, mak­ing it suit­able and acces­si­ble air­craft for fam­i­ly, friends, and com­muters with an afford­able oper­at­ing cost per per­son.

With the sup­port of the Japan­ese gov­ern­ment through the SBIR pro­gram, Sky­Drive is going to devel­op the air­craft to ful­ly sat­is­fy mar­ket demands with the spec­i­fi­ca­tion required from oper­a­tors and be mass-pro­duced, and also to obtain Type Cer­ti­fi­ca­tion
for com­mer­cial oper­a­tion in the next five years.

The SBIR pro­gram enables Sky­Drive to accel­er­ate its research and devel­op­ment efforts, focus­ing on improv­ing the per­for­mance, safe­ty, and effi­cien­cy of its eVTOL air­craft. It will also sup­port the devel­op­ment of new tech­nolo­gies and sys­tems nec­es­sary for the suc­cess­ful deploy­ment of eVTOLs in Japan and beyond.

Ear­li­er this month, Sky­Drive announced con­tin­u­al progress with the Suzu­ki Motor Cor­po­ra­tion since its col­lab­o­ra­tion agree­ment on shar­ing busi­ness and tech­nol­o­gy in March 2022, suc­cess­ful­ly fol­lowed by a basic agree­ment on man­u­fac­tur­ing in June 2023.

Sky­Drive to pro­duce up to 100 of its eVTOL air­craft per year at Suzu­ki Plant, after estab­lish­ing pro­duc­tion sub­sidiary