It also continues to be an exciting time in the emerging and ground-breaking Electric Vertical Take-Off and Landing (eVTOL) aircraft market with many start-ups and established players competing to be the first to commercially introduce the air taxis of the future.
Electric propulsion systems are a key enabler for this new urban mobility offering: distributed, electrically powered propellers can be placed in different fixed positions on the aircraft and/or be tilted to allow for both lift and cruise operation. They can also be operated to control aircraft hover mode by individually controlling their torque and hence vectoring the airframe position. And only when being silent and environmentally friendly, Urban Air Mobility will experience broad social acceptance.
The first markets will develop through fixed point-to-point connections in mega-cities, serving routes that are already served by helicopters today, for example. We see real commercial use in the mid-twenties, although large volumes of such aircraft are not expected until the 2030s.
We plan to launch an electric propulsion and energy storage system for eVTOL in a few years, with the aim to become a leading Tier 1 supplier for complete electrical power systems for UAM in the long run.