Vertical Aerospace announces deals with American Airlines, Avolon and Virgin Atlantic

On 10 June, Vertical Aerospace announced it secured investments, partnerships and aircraft order-deals with multiple companies like Rolls-Royce, GKN, Microsoft and Honeywell. Most interesting for us aviation enthusiasts is the commitments signed by American Airlines, Avolon and Virgin Atlantic for up to 1,000 VA-X4 eVTOLs.

American Airlines has agreed to pre-order, subject to certain conditions and milestones up to 250 aircraft with options for an additional 100 VA-X4s. Lessor Avolon has pre-ordered 310 aircraft with options on another 190 and Virgin Atlantic has placed an option to order between 50 and 150 VA-X4s.

Vertical Aerospace has been launched in 2016 with the aim "to make air travel personal, on demand and carbon free". It has produced two prototypes to test technologies. The VA-X1 (flown for the first time in 2018) and the VA-X2 (flown first in 2019). The VA-X4 was officially launched in 2020 and will be able to carry four passengers (next to the pilot) over a distance of 160 km with a maximum speed of 325 km/hr. It will be near-silent in flight and has no CO2-emissions. Next to a passenger-variant, the company is also planning a medevac- and a cargo-variant. Vertical Aerospace is working on the VA-X4 prototype with a first test-flight planned for later this year. Entry into commercial service should then happen by 2024 depending, of course, on the progress of the certification process.

Photo by Vertical Aerospace.