Two years after his announced with great fanfare at the Salon du Bourget 2019The flying taxi could therefore take its first steps in the skies above Paris. Paris at June 2021. This is the aim of the roadmap unveiled on 18th January by the instigators of the project, first and foremost the following groups RATP, ADP and Choose Paris Region. "From June 2021, in close collaboration with the French Civil Aviation Authority (DGAC) and with the support of the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) and Eurocontrol, the European organisation for the safety of air navigation, parking, take-off and landing operations can be tested in a real aeronautical environment at Pontoise, as well as operations around the vehicle, including maintenance and electrical recharging", states the press release published on Monday. It goes on to say that the real deadline should be - as might be expected - the Olympic Games three years down the line: "the prospect of the 2024 Olympic and Paralympic Games is an exceptional opportunity to mobilise the industry, to prepare a demonstrator for the future, and to make Paris Region a benchmark in the global market for urban air mobility".
To meet this timetable, the project managers have already selected their team. An enlarged group ofsome thirty partners is now known, selected from some 150 applications from 25 countries. This conglomerate is structured around five areas of work (vehicle, infrastructure, operations, airspace integration and acceptability), and brings together a number of heavyweights from the aeronautical industry. These include Air France, Safran and Airbus, VolocopterDassault and École Polytechnique. Chinese company Ehang and American firm Zipline are also among the winners (see below).
" The success of this call for expressions of interest, conducted alongside the ADP Group and the RATP Group, demonstrates the international attractiveness of the Paris Region and the importance of our region for the development of the industries of the future.says Franck Margain, Chairman of Choose Paris Region. Through the collaboration of public and private players, and by inviting innovative companies from all over the world to join us to complete our value chain, we are building a unique ecosystem to develop urban air mobility, to strengthen the future attractiveness of our region, and to support responsible industries and employment. "he continues.
The winners:
Vehicle category
- Airbus (France): aircraft manufacturer;
- Ascendance Flight Technologies (France): manufacturer of the Atea hybrid VTOL passenger transport system;
- Ehang (China): manufacturer of electric VTOL passenger vehicles;
- H3 Dynamics (Singapore): developer of hydrogen-powered VTOL systems;
- Pipistrel (Slovenia): manufacturer of electric aircraft and logistics VTOLs;
- Safran Electronics & Defense (France): manufacturer of the Patroller UAV and solutions and services in optronics, avionics, electronics and critical software for civil and military applications;
- Vertical Aerospace (UK): manufacturer of the eVTOL VA-1X passenger transport system;
- Volocopter (Germany): manufacturer of the electric vertical take-off vehicle (eVTOL);
- Zipline (United States): manufacturer and operator of logistics drones.
Operations category :
- Air France (France): contribution expected in several areas, in particular aircraft maintenance and repair;
- CAE (Canada): flight training technologies using modelling and simulation;
- Dassault Falcon Services (France): a subsidiary of Dassault Aviation specialising in operations
maintenance and other services for business aviation ; - ESTACA (France): engineering school specialising in mobility and aeronautical techniques (including aircraft maintenance);
- Helifirst (France): helicopter airline specialising in business aviation;
- Helipass (France): digital platform for booking helicopter flights.
Infrastructure category :
Green Motion (Switzerland): supplier of recharging systems for electric vehicles;
IDEMIA I&S (France): specialist in digital security solutions, biometrics and
identification/authentication ;
Leosphere (France): Lidar equipment to generate state-of-the-art weather forecasts;
Skyports (United Kingdom): designer and operator of vertiports and logistics VTOLs.
Airspace integration category :
- Cergy Université and ESSEC (France): a group of universities and schools with 25,000 students, including Europe's leading Junior Entreprise;
ENAC (France): civil aviation engineering school with a chair in drone systems; - Internest (France): precision positioning solution enabling automatic landings in degraded environments;
- M3 Systems (Belgium): high-performance on-board geolocation applications ;
- Thales SIX (France): interoperable on-board anti-collision systems.
Acceptability category :
- Bruitparif (France): technical assessment centre for the noise environment in the Ile-de-France region;
- École Polytechnique (France): engineering school with a Masters specialising in technological innovation and new business models;
- Envirosuite (Australia): provider of a digital technology platform for collecting localised data to improve environmental performance.
- Institute of Transportation Studies at the University of California Berkeley, NEXTOR (United States): university research centre in the field of mobility and transport;
- ONERA (France): public aeronautics, space and defence research establishment;
- Royal Netherlands Aerospace Centre (Netherlands): centre for aeronautical expertise, consultancy and research
