Urban-Air Port partners with Dassault Systèmes for its global vertiport development, starting with ‘Air One’

Urban-Air Port has select­ed Das­sault Sys­temes’ 3DEXPERIENCE plat­form to sup­port the devel­op­ment of its ver­ti­port prod­ucts glob­al­ly, start­ing with the ini­tial ‘Air One’ mod­el in Coven­try.

The com­pa­ny will be able to cre­ate ‘vir­tu­al twins’ of infra­struc­ture and man­age them through­out oper­a­tions across all future devel­op­ment at oth­er sites.

Select­ed as a win­ner of the UK government’s Future Flight Chal­lenge Phase 2 in 2021, Air One will demon­strate how sus­tain­able advanced air mobil­i­ty can reduce con­ges­tion, cut air pol­lu­tion and decar­bonise trans­port, while pro­vid­ing seam­less pas­sen­ger jour­neys and car­go deliv­er­ies.  

As a his­toric hub for the auto­mo­bile and aero­space indus­try, Coven­try has a pool of peo­ple and skills that can sup­port the man­u­fac­tur­ing indus­tries of the future, and its posi­tion also pro­vides easy access to most parts of the coun­try with­in four hours, mak­ing it a per­fect loca­tion for devel­op­ment. 

Ricky Sand­hu, Founder & Exec­u­tive Chair­man at Urban-Air Port, says: “Das­sault Sys­temes’ expe­ri­ence, com­bined with a world-class rep­u­ta­tion for inno­va­tion in 3D design, has been recog­nised in the devel­op­ment of some of the world’s lead­ing EVTOL and OEM brands. 

“Their work in pre­ci­sion design, vir­tu­al twin mod­el­ling and test­ing ensures deliv­ery of the high­est qual­i­ty, and this is an excit­ing new way of deliv­er­ing mass-pro­duced infra­struc­ture — only Das­sault Sys­temes can pro­vide the lev­el of func­tion­al­i­ty we require.”

Ben­e­fits will be seen in key areas includ­ing: 

• Design: Incor­po­rat­ing archi­tec­tur­al and engi­neer­ing design into the vir­tu­al twin to allow for greater use of the 3D data, not only with­in engi­neer­ing but across mul­ti­ple busi­ness func­tions.
• Plan­ning: The plat­form will allow for a sin­gle source of data truth, sim­pli­fied report­ing process and bet­ter col­lab­o­ra­tion with sup­pli­ers.
• Fab­ri­ca­tion: Enable fab­ri­ca­tors to rapid­ly devel­op the design shared by engi­neers into mass pro­duc­tion’
• Asset and facil­i­ty man­age­ment: The vir­tu­al twin will allow Urban-Air Port to opti­mise their ver­ti­ports and main­te­nance of their infra­struc­ture in real-time
• Oper­a­tions: Opti­mi­sa­tion of prod­uct usage such as ener­gy con­sump­tion, which will help inform more sus­tain­able designs in future devel­op­ments.

“Coven­try is quick­ly becom­ing a hub for sus­tain­able trans­port devel­op­ment, and Urban-Air Port’s ambi­tion is an unde­ni­able match for the 3DEXPERIENCE Platform’s capa­bil­i­ties,” says John Kitch­ing­man, Man­ag­ing Direc­tor of EuroNorth at Das­sault Sys­temes. 

Air One’s con­struc­tion is due to be com­plet­ed around mid April, with the inau­gur­al flight tak­ing off at the offi­cial launch event to be held on April 25th. From April 28th to May, Air One will be open to the pub­lic, with tours pro­vid­ed by the Urban-Air Port team. 

Last month, Urban-Air Port announced it would col­lab­o­rate with Leeds Brad­ford Air­port to devel­op an off-grid, hydro­gen-pow­ered infra­struc­ture hub, as well as capac­i­ty for eVTOL air­craft stor­age and charg­ing.