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Archer Aviation, an electric aircraft start-up company, has announced a partnership with Atlantic Aviation and together the two companies will begin the development of electric aircraft infrastructure at Atlantic’s existing assets, including Santa Monica Municipal Airport (SMO).

San Jose-based Archer has been developing electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) aircraft since 2018 and Texas-based Atlantic is a leading fixed-base operator (FBO) network and aviation services provider. With their combined resources, they aim to establish an air taxi service that utilizes existing assets at specific locations. Early launch markets will focus on highly congested cities such as Los Angeles, New York and Miami.

Atlantic and Archer anticipate launch of service across these initial locations in 2025 and subsequent expansion of services to other locations across Atlantic’s portfolio as availability of Archer’s eVTOL aircraft increases.

“We’re building a vertical takeoff and landing aircraft, capable of carrying four passengers and a pilot plus a little bit of luggage and it’s 100% all-electric,” Nikhil Goel, Chief Commercial Officer at Archer Aviation says. “It can take off vertically, like a helicopter, but then it flies forward on a wing, just like a normal airplane. The reason that’s really important is that helicopters are very loud and they’re tremendously expensive. The aircraft we’re building, they’re 100 times quieter than helicopters,” he added.

“They’re fully redundant, meaning there’s no part on the aircraft that if it were to fail would cause the flight to fail. And so that allows it to be much safer than a helicopter. And it’s very affordable. So a flight from Santa Monica to Malibu for example, or Santa Monica to Orange County would cost just as much as an Uber if not a little bit less,” Goel says.

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“Climbing. Fast.” A dozen leaders from across the industry gathered to launch a new initiative called “Climbing. Fast.,” affirming the entire sector’s commitment to net-zero emissions by 2050. NBAA President and CEO Ed Bolen said, “At NBAA-BACE we made clear: business aviation is on a mission to net zero – and we are Climbing. Fast.”

Newsmakers Panel: Hybrid electric aircraft coming soon. Industry visionaries leading the development of hybrid and electric aircraft propulsion joined the FAA’s head of aviation safety for a panel on opening day. Topics included fuel systems, regulation and markets.

Notable quotes: Huge growth opportunity: “While urban air mobility is certainly one application for electric aircraft, there’s a much bigger market in regional air mobility or longer-range flights of up to a few hundred miles,” said Marc Ausman, chief product officer at Electra, a company developing a hybrid-electric short takeoff and landing aircraft.

That said, challenges remain. AAM operations must demonstrate the ability to safely interact with other aircraft. Infrastructure is another key focus area for the industry, including concerns about whether already-stressed regional power grids will be able to support large-scale AAM operations.

Dan Elwell, an advisory board member for Joby, pointed to legislation like SB 100 in California, which is intended to scale up renewable energy production to offset the gap. “I don’t view infrastructure as a big hurdle for us,” he added. “There are thousands of heliports around the U.S., and we’re also going to be able to use large parking lots. We should be able to get back to rooftop operations as long as we have a charging capability.”

Many industry stakeholders aim to begin small-scale commercial AAM operations by 2025, and Volocopter hopes to fly even sooner, during the 2024 Paris Summer Olympics.

To make that happen, FAA Air Traffic Organization COO Tim Arel noted that AAM must not only safely operate among other aircraft, but also such new entities as commercial space providers.

“Our approach is [to provide] equitable access to the airspace. As all that comes together, our concern is how everyone will play together,” he said. “So, getting to scale is going to be our biggest challenge in our airspace.”

Arel pointed to the agency’s “Innovate28” initiative as a practical roadmap toward that goal.

“There are a lot of incremental tests and coordination efforts that we’re going to do around the country, all aimed toward a fully integrated system of all players in the LA basin by [the Los Angeles Summer Olympics in] 2028,” he said.

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