Lights and shadows of the eVTOL industry and much more: aviation recap
Joby Aviation
eVTOL roundup: insurance, test flights, China update
AutoFlight has launched an insurance product for its CarryAll cargo eVTOL.
The insurance itself is provided by a Chinese insurer. Perhaps not as exciting as a flight demo, but pretty essential: eVTOLs will need comprehensive insurance coverage to be rolled out in the real world.
On the more spectacular side, some amazing pictures have emerged of Joby's flight testing in the Bay Area.
But also worth reading is a critical analysis of Joby's latest shareholder letter by Adrian Norris, an industry analyst and consultant who joined the podcast to share his views on the hype that still surrounds the eVTOL industry. For more context, check out the episode "An Advanced Air Mobility Reality Check" on the Allplane podcast.
Yet another critical take on the eVTOL industry, or more specifically, on some of the most headline-prone, capital-intensive players.
After flight test campaigns in Norway, New Zealand and the US, BETA Technologies has tested its ALIA CTOL aircraft in Scotland together with Loganair and Royal Mail.
The aircraft looks remarkably striking in the Royal Mail red livery! BETA Technologies also received an order from Hawaii.
In the meantime, Embraer's Eve continues its test campaign, this time in front of Brazilian President Lula da Silva.
And in China, EHang seems poised to start commercial ticketed service any time now in both Guangzhou and Hefei. The tourist flights will carry one person at a time (although a fleet will be operating simultaneously), and the starting fare will be 299 RMB (US$43).
Also in China, Aridge, the eVTOL arm of XPeng (with which it has developed a car-launched small eVTOL) has raised $200 million.
Vertical Aerospace, moving forward with battery-making
Vertical Aerospace has started producing batteries for the Valo eVTOL. To be clear, the British firm had already assembled the battery packs that powered its first prototypes.
What it is doing now is a pilot test of the automated manufacturing line that should be equipping the first Valo production aircraft. Here is an interesting figure to retain: Vertical Aerospace expects to produce 45,000 batteries between now and 2035!
Vaeridion opens a new industrial facility
Vaeridion has inaugurated its new industrial facility at Oberpfaffenhofen Airport, located in the former Lilium premises near Munich. The German startup also received a megawatt charger prototype from NRG2fly.
A unique drone testing facility on Native American reservation
On AeroTime, an interesting piece on how Swiss firm Windshape has built a unique facility to test drones within the Osage Nation reservation in Oklahoma.
A sad end for a Thai Airways A380
Aviation photographer Dirk Grothe has shared pictures of a Thai Airways A380 (HS-TUE) turned into a bar or entertainment venue. This is a particularly touching story for me personally, because I attended the delivery of this very aircraft in Toulouse in late 2013.
AeroSHARK: Austrian Airlines publishes one year results
Austrian Airlines has published the results of its use of AeroSHARK technology — a fuselage coating that improves aerodynamic performance.
The Austrian carrier has been using it on 4 of its Boeing 777s for a full year and reports a 0.77% average drag improvement and savings of 930 tonnes of fuel — the equivalent of 20 Vienna–New York flights. A detail worth noting: Austrian Airlines even released a song dedicated to AeroSHARK!
Air France-KLM Misses pays penalty on missed carbon target
Air France-KLM missed its own carbon abatement goal for 2025 (using 2019 emissions as a benchmark), triggering a financial penalty of €7.5M because those goals were enshrined in the conditions of a "green bond" the airline group had issued.
There are plenty of other interesting sustainability-related details in the latest company report, perfectly summarised by Christopher Surgenor at Green Air News. For example, AF-KLM's uptake of SAF was 2.9% last year, but the extra cost was more than recovered through fuel surcharges and voluntary passenger contributions.
🎙️ New podcast episode: engine leasing on the Blockchain
There is a new episode of the podcast about how US financial firm Forum-Markets aims to open up engine leasing as an investment class using blockchain tokens to securitise engine leasing cash flows.
Other interesting aviation stories:
Kenya Airways is back in the red after a profitable 2024. The airline blames the grounding of several Dreamliners during 2025 for the reversal.
Wizz Air's new CCO Ian Malin spoke at Aviation Event Cluj 2026 about how the airline has been hedging a significant portion of its fuel needs. This happened at pretty much the same time as Wizz Air announced it would start trialling inflight connectivity together with Immfly.
Luxury airline beOnd is adding Paris and London as destinations for the next winter season.
