FutureFlight

Cranfield Aerospace Solutions (CAeS) has selected Evolito will provide the electric motor and inverters for its Project Fresson hydrogen-powered aircraft. Under the terms of an agreement announced on April 14. Evolito will contribute to efforts to retrofit twin-engined Britten-Norman Islander aircraft to carry nine passengers on short-haul routes, with the goal of having the first converted models approved in 2025.

With the FAA determining that its FlightOS technology satisfies the current means-of-compliance requirements for flight controls, Skyryse believes it could install the first of the new systems on existing helicopters and fixed-wing aircraft under supplemental type certificates during 2024.

Regent is inviting prospective customers and partners to inspect a full-scale mock-up of the Viceroy sea glider it expects to be ready for passenger-carrying commercial flights in 2025. It also announced the selection of key suppliers for the electric-powered vehicles' motors and batteries.

Autonomous aviation pioneer Xwing says it has formally begun the FAA approval process for its “Superpilot” autonomous flight control system, which the company plans to use for pilotless cargo delivery flights in the U.S.

Xwing says it recently filed its project-specific certification plan with the FAA, making the company’s self-piloting Cessna cargo airplane the first standard-category large uncrewed aircraft system (UAS) to receive official project designation from the agency. 

Maeve Aerospace believes that batteries provided by Amprius will be sufficient to support an all-electric aircraft carrying 44 passengers on city pairs of up to 460 km (250 nmi) by 2029. The start-up says its design will be scalable so that as propulsion technology improves both payload and range can be increased progressively to more than 50 passengers and 710 km.

SkyDrive has started accepting preorders from private individuals for its SD-05 two-seat eVTOL aircraft. The Japanese company has been securing preorders from business customers since unveiling a new design for the vehicle in September 2022, with Vietnam’s Pacific Group being the first to commit with an agreement to take up to 100 units.

Merlin, a Boston-based company developing “drop-in” autonomy kits for legacy fixed-wing aircraft, has received a $1 million contract from the FAA to demonstrate its autonomous flight control technology in the National Airspace System. Flight trials will take place over Alaska starting in the second quarter of 2023, and all test flights will have safety pilots on board to monitor the airplanes, which initially will be remotely operated or monitored by a pilot on the ground.

Aircraft leasing group LCI is looking to accelerate its diversification strategy fueled by a capital injection from the acquisition of a 35 percent stake by Sumitomo Mitsui Finance and Leasing Company (SMFL). Announcing the agreement on March 29, LCI’s parent, Libra Group, said the further support from its Japanese partner will aid efforts to grow LCI’s business by around $1.5 billion, with a significant portion of this expansion coming from taking positions in the fast-emerging advanced air mobility (AAM) sector.

The advanced air mobility (AAM) industry aims to begin operating thousands of air taxis, delivery drones, and other types of novel aircraft in the U.S. within the next decade. Along with the rise in the number of aircraft flying in our skies, the amount of noise pollution created by the aviation industry is certainly going to increase. In an effort to better understand and reduce aviation noise, the FAA has awarded $19 million in research grants to 14 universities across the nation. Projects that these grant recipients will be working on include developing noise abatement procedures, assessing the impact of noise on the environment and communities, and acoustic modeling of new aircraft emerging from the AAM sector.

European aircraft systems specialist Liebherr is supporting Airbus's ZeroE hydrogen airliner program by developing an air supply system for its fuel cells. The study announced this week will support efforts for the development of a technology demonstrator aircraft to establish the most realistic approach to producing commercially viable aircraft for service entry during the 2030s.