So this is our electric vertical takeoff and landing aircraft
called midnight. It takes off and lands like a
helicopter and it flies forward on a wing like an
airplane. And it's really designed for missions that we
call urban air mobility. So these are trips that
are less than 100 miles trips where people are spending
anywhere from 60 to 90 minutes on the ground in
a car that we can replace in the air with
5 to 10 minute trips. Really, the potential
here is quite massive. The goal is to be
able to move really the masses to the sky.
So if you think about commuting today, we are
very comfortable sitting in a car for 30 minutes,
60 minutes, 90 minutes. And then we also
look at the very select few that are able to
utilize helicopters. Helicopters are very convenient because they replace
those 30 minute 60 minute trips with five minute flights
. Our goal is to really bring that to the
masses so everybody can have an opportunity to take to
the sky, save lots of time and go where
they want the less regulatory onerous burden that you see
in front of you is the kind of target markets
that you're looking at. So, so it'd be
interesting to know kind of where in the US,
where, where in the world you're looking at the
UAE you're looking at India, are these the kinds
of markets that from a regulatory point of view are
gonna be faster, easier, more nimble for you
to put this product to work in. So in
the US, the FAA tells you where you can
fly, but the local municipalities tell you where you
can take off and land. So you want to
find places that are very supportive across the board where
there is a whole network, a consortium of companies
that have come together to enable U AM. So
in the US, there are several places that are
really attractive. New York City, for example,
has been one where really the city has leaned in
to help really grow these networks. Los Angeles really
would be the ultimate example of where we could go
where there are so many daily trips that take place
that are so long that people suffer every day.
But would be is California an easy, an easy
place to work with California has many markets that would
be very, very attractive, but there's also a
lot of markets that might be quicker to enter into
. So markets in Florida markets in Texas, for
example. So we have a big partner in United
Airlines and United has hubs all across the country specifically
, they have hubs at LAX and SFO in California
, but they also have hubs in Houston, which
is really exciting as well in Texas. And,
and is that the model you can apply to the
rest of the world? That's why you're here in
, in Dubai, you've already talked about the fact
that, that they are forward link, uh uh
looking here, India, I'm, I'm assuming is
taking the same approach as well. Is that kinda
, I if you think about the markets you're gonna
roll out in, it's the ones that are gonna
be easier to get into first, presumably that you
are going going to look to enter first because this
really is a global product really, it's not necessarily
just unique to any specific market. We are going
to start with markets that we think will be big
business, but also be easier to enter into because
there is such strong support. Where does that leave
? Europe? Europe is also very interesting. There's
a large population, it's one of the largest flying
populations out there. And so there's a regulatory process
to go through that we will go through as well
. And as we get through that process, we'll
look down to that market as well. And in
terms of the potential, is it just bigger batteries
more range, is it battery technology that is ultimately
going to determine the evolution of where you ultimately take
this product? The good news is that batteries today
that you can buy off the shelf are good enough
to really enable urban air mobility trips that are less
than 100 miles. But the good news is that
batteries are getting better and as batteries do get better
, it not only just gives us better range,
but it also gives better payload capacity. So we
can add more luxuries into the vehicles. We can
carry more people, but then at some point,
it will really max out and we can actually start
taking batteries out of the plane which will just lower
costs. And so the goal here is to have
a mass market solution that is affordable for everyone.