Zuri Shares Update On Build Progress Of Its Second Large-Scale Technology Demonstrator

Czech Repub­lic start­up Zuri has shared more updates on the progress of its sec­ond tech­nol­o­gy demon­stra­tor (TD 2.0), as the com­pa­ny con­tin­ues to work towards build­ing its hybrid-elec­tric tiltro­tor air­craft.

Designed as an all-met­al, unmanned plat­form in the 700-kilo­gram class, TD 2.0 will val­i­date the hybrid propul­sion sys­tem, tiltro­tor mech­a­nism, and con­trol laws that form the foun­da­tion of Zuri’s future five-seat hybrid ver­ti­cal take­off and land­ing (VTOL) air­craft.

It uses a hybrid pow­er sys­tem designed to pro­vide con­tin­u­ous cruise pow­er, while bat­ter­ies sup­ply short-dura­tion peak thrust for take­off, land­ing, and tran­si­tion.

Air­frame devel­op­ment accel­er­at­ed in April 2025, with TD 2.0 flight test­ing sched­uled to begin in late 2026 or ear­ly 2027. Insights from this cam­paign direct­ly inform the final air­craft design, which will tran­si­tion to advanced com­pos­ites, achieve long region­al range with­out recharg­ing, and oper­ate SAF-ready from day one, deliv­er­ing a prac­ti­cal path toward sus­tain­able region­al air mobil­i­ty.

Overview

Zuri has entered a new phase in its mis­sion to bring effi­cient, sus­tain­able hybrid VTOL tech­nol­o­gy to region­al flight. Zuri Tech­nol­o­gy Demon­stra­tor 2.0 rep­re­sents a deci­sive step for­ward in val­i­dat­ing the sys­tems and aero­dy­nam­ic prin­ci­ples that will define the com­pa­ny’s next-gen­er­a­tion hybrid VTOL air­craft.

Built on the suc­cess of the first-gen­er­a­tion 11-meter demon­stra­tor, which com­plet­ed flight test­ing under Czech LCAA super­vi­sion, TD 2.0 incor­po­rates lessons from years of sim­u­la­tion, sub­scale test­ing, and full-scale exper­i­men­ta­tion.

Key Advances in TD 2.0

TD 2.0 intro­duces major advance­ments in three inter­con­nect­ed areas that form the back­bone of Zuri’s hybrid VTOL design phi­los­o­phy.

Hybrid Pow­er­train

The demon­stra­tor inte­grates a hybrid propul­sion sys­tem that com­bines the best of elec­tric and inter­nal com­bus­tion tech­nolo­gies to deliv­er extend­ed range, oper­a­tional flex­i­bil­i­ty, and reduced envi­ron­men­tal impact. This con­fig­u­ra­tion enables long region­al mis­sions with­out stop­ping to recharge, a key require­ment for real-world oper­a­tions.

Full Flight Mode Capa­bil­i­ty

Advanced tiltro­tors allow TD 2.0 to oper­ate across all phas­es of flight, includ­ing ver­ti­cal take­off and land­ing, tran­si­tion, and cruise, to val­i­date sta­bil­i­ty and effi­cien­cy. These modes have already been demon­strat­ed exten­sive­ly in more than ten sub­scale mod­els, and TD 2.0 now val­i­dates them at full scale through unmanned test­ing.

Refined Design

A redesigned tail assem­bly and opti­mized propul­sion lay­out improve aero­dy­nam­ic sta­bil­i­ty and reduce drag in for­ward flight. Togeth­er with dis­trib­uted thrust and tiltro­tor mech­a­nisms, this con­fig­u­ra­tion increas­es cruise effi­cien­cy and requires rough­ly three times less thrust than ver­ti­cal lift.

A Struc­tured Path of Devel­op­ment

Zuri Hybrid VTOL is pro­gress­ing through a delib­er­ate, phased devel­op­ment sequence to build tech­ni­cal matu­ri­ty step by step.

Found­ing and Con­cept Devel­op­ment

Def­i­n­i­tion of the Zuri hybrid VTOL con­cept, ear­ly aero­dy­nam­ic stud­ies, and ini­tial sys­tem archi­tec­ture.

Tech­nol­o­gy Demon­stra­tor 1.0

A full-scale pro­to­type with an 11-meter wingspan that com­plet­ed flight test­ing under Czech LCAA over­sight, val­i­dat­ing VTOL prin­ci­ples, con­trol log­ic, and sta­bil­i­ty mod­els.

Tech­nol­o­gy Demon­stra­tor 2.0 (cur­rent stage)

A 700-kilo­gram hybrid VTOL capa­ble of both VTOL and CTOL oper­a­tion. TD 2.0 is being devel­oped in align­ment with SORA cer­ti­fi­ca­tion prin­ci­ples and will test hybrid-elec­tric propul­sion, flight con­trol laws, and tran­si­tion per­for­mance.

Future Cer­ti­fied Air­craft

A five-seat hybrid VTOL for region­al mis­sions that com­bines fixed-wing range and per­for­mance with the flex­i­bil­i­ty and sus­tain­abil­i­ty of elec­tric propul­sion.

Spec­i­fi­ca­tion	Tech­nol­o­gy Demon­stra­tor 2.0	Future Hybrid VTOL Air­craft (Five-Seat)
MTOW	690 kg	2 800 kg
Cruise Speed (Vc)	200 km/h	350 km/h
Range	200 – 250 km *	700 km *

^*Visu­al Flight Rules
(Val­ues sub­ject to ongo­ing val­i­da­tion as part of test and devel­op­ment pro­gram)

Engi­neer­ing Devel­op­ment in Prague

The Iron Bird, Zuri’s inte­grat­ed sys­tems ground test plat­form, is cur­rent­ly in devel­op­ment, serv­ing as the core envi­ron­ment for val­i­dat­ing hybrid-elec­tric sys­tems. Work on the TD 2.0 air­frame accel­er­at­ed in April 2025, with flight test­ing expect­ed to begin by the first quar­ter of 2027.

This engi­neer­ing set­up enables Zuri to tight­ly cou­ple dig­i­tal sim­u­la­tion, lab­o­ra­to­ry test­ing, and phys­i­cal val­i­da­tion, ensur­ing rig­or­ous sys­tem-lev­el matu­ri­ty.

All-Met­al Demon­stra­tor, Com­pos­ite Future

TD 2.0 is an all-met­al air­craft cho­sen for its adapt­abil­i­ty, inspec­tion pre­ci­sion, and cost effi­cien­cy. Met­al con­struc­tion allows rapid design changes and eas­i­er main­te­nance, mak­ing it ide­al for an evolv­ing demon­stra­tor.

The final Zuri hybrid VTOL air­craft will tran­si­tion to advanced com­pos­ite mate­ri­als to reduce struc­tur­al weight, increase aero­dy­nam­ic effi­cien­cy, and meet com­mer­cial cer­ti­fi­ca­tion stan­dards.

This pro­gres­sion, mov­ing from metal­lic pro­to­typ­ing to com­pos­ite pro­duc­tion, rep­re­sents a prag­mat­ic engi­neer­ing path from exper­i­men­tal to oper­a­tional air­craft.

Tiltro­tor Design and Effi­cien­cy

TD 2.0 fea­tures a new tail and propul­sion con­fig­u­ra­tion with four large-diam­e­ter propul­sion units posi­tioned for aero­dy­nam­ic bal­ance. The air­craft’s eight active rotors improve cruise effi­cien­cy and pro­vide built-in redun­dan­cy for safe­ty.

In for­ward flight, the tiltro­tor con­fig­u­ra­tion requires up to three times less thrust than in hov­er, sig­nif­i­cant­ly improv­ing range and mis­sion endurance. This is a defin­ing advan­tage for hybrid-elec­tric region­al oper­a­tions.

Hybrid Propul­sion Sys­tem Val­i­da­tion

At the core of TD 2.0 is Zuri’s hybrid-elec­tric propul­sion sys­tem, which com­bines bat­tery-dri­ven elec­tric pow­er with an effi­cient com­bus­tion engine. This enables longer mis­sions, improved ener­gy den­si­ty, and more pre­dictable oper­a­tional per­for­mance.

TD 2.0 will val­i­date:

• Hybrid sys­tem con­trol log­ic and pow­er man­age­ment across all flight phas­es
• Bat­tery struc­ture, cool­ing, and per­for­mance under oper­a­tional loads
• Ener­gy flow opti­miza­tion between the gen­er­a­tor, bat­ter­ies, and motors
• Safe­ty and redun­dan­cy archi­tec­ture for hybrid-elec­tric flight

This hybrid archi­tec­ture will also form the foun­da­tion for Zuri’s future pro­duc­tion air­craft, extend­ing range, low­er­ing emis­sions, and ensur­ing Sus­tain­able Avi­a­tion Fuel com­pat­i­bil­i­ty from day one.

From Sim­u­la­tion to Sky

TD 2.0 func­tions as a sys­tem-lev­el val­i­da­tion plat­form, bridg­ing advanced sim­u­la­tion with phys­i­cal flight. It enables ver­i­fi­ca­tion of aero­dy­nam­ic, struc­tur­al, and con­trol mod­els and con­firms sys­tem inter­ac­tions across mul­ti­ple domains.

Full-enve­lope data col­lect­ed from TD 2.0 will refine dig­i­tal twin mod­els, enhance pre­dic­tive accu­ra­cy, and accel­er­ate cer­ti­fi­ca­tion readi­ness for Zuri’s pro­duc­tion air­craft.

Shap­ing the Future of Region­al Air Mobil­i­ty

Zuri’s vision for region­al air mobil­i­ty is to pro­vide effi­cient, sus­tain­able, and safe point-to-point access across under­served regions. The hybrid VTOL archi­tec­ture com­bines the range and cruise per­for­mance of a fixed-wing air­craft with ver­ti­cal capa­bil­i­ty, sup­port­ing oper­a­tions inde­pen­dent of major air­port infra­struc­ture.

The upcom­ing air­craft will use hybrid propul­sion to deliv­er long region­al range with­out recharg­ing and will be SAF-ready from day one, align­ing with glob­al sus­tain­abil­i­ty goals while remain­ing prac­ti­cal for near-term adop­tion. The future five-seat air­craft is being devel­oped around a mis­sion-range class of approx­i­mate­ly 700 km, suit­ed for region­al mobil­i­ty beyond short-hop urban trav­el.