Lilium has appointed accountancy group KPMG to start a mergers and acquisitions process it hopes will avoid bankruptcy and keep its plans alive to bring its six-passenger eVTOL aircraft to market. The company announced the move on November 5 after a court in Weilheim approved insolvency administration filings and appointed a custodian and “chief insolvency officers.”
According to Lilium, KPMG is about to start briefings with prospective new investors. The company urgently needs to raise new funds after the German parliament recently blocked loan guarantees needed to support work on the Lilium Jet.
When New York’s Nasdaq market opens on November 6, trading in Lilium’s shares will be suspended. Its ordinary shares can still be traded on an “over the counter” basis, but this is expected to see trading volumes and the stock price fall.
During the self-administration process, Lilium’s management team remains in charge of the company. They are working with court-appointed attorney Ivo-Meinert Willrodt as provisional custodian and two chief insolvency officers, Gerrit Hölze and Thorsten Bieg, who are lawyers specializing in corporate restructuring.
The custodian’s core responsibility is to protect the interests of Lilium’s creditors. Lilium is a public company headquartered in the Netherlands, but its core subsidiaries operate in the Munich area and it is these companies that are subject to the self-administration process.
Work on Lilium Jet Prototypes Continues
With more than 1,000 employees on the payroll, Lilium said that work is continuing to complete assembly of two full-scale prototypes of the Lilium Jet. The first aircraft recently complete low-voltage power-on trials as part of preparations for flight testing with the second aircraft to start in 2025. The fuselage and wings for a third prototype are being assembled by Spanish aerostructures suppliers Aciturri and Aernnova.
At the end of October, Lilium moved a fully assembled conforming Lilium Jet airframe into a static test rig for structural testing. This is part of the preparation for crewed test flights and EASA type certification.
According to Lilium it still has provisional sales agreements for 780 aircraft from operators in the U.S., South America, Europe, Asia and the Middle East. These consist of a mix of firm orders, reservations, options and memoranda of understanding, but it is unclear what pre-purchase deposit payments may have been collected to date. The company said it has informed its suppliers about “expectations and procedural steps” for the insolvency process.
“With the support of our appointed custodian and the restructuring experts, we at Lilium remain fully focused on re-emerging following restructuring, with fresh investment to support the all-electric Lilium Jet’s path to certification and entry into service,” said the company’s CEO, Klaus Roewe.