China’s EHang To Pilot Air Taxis In Guangzhou

With a pilot for a citywide deployment, China’s EHang will create a network of air taxis as well as transports in Guangzhou. The company is geared toward creating as well as deploying autonomous passenger and freight vehicles, according to reports.

The experimental run will home in not just on demonstrating that an aircraft that is rotor-powered and low-altitude can be sensible for city use: It is also aimed at showing that a network of the devices can work together while being monitored as well as controlled through a central hub for traffic management that the company will create in conjunction with the government of Guangzhou.

According to the report, China’s Civil Aviation Administration selected EHang as the only company to create autonomous flying passenger vehicle services. The company has had many flights in Guangzhou last year and has already showed flights of Ehang 184 that ferried passengers earlier in 2018 in Vienna.

In separate aviation technology news, Skyports and Volocopter announced earlier this year that they are teaming up to build the first mobile Volo-Port for air taxis. The Volo-Port will be the physical landing pad for electric take-off and landing (eVTOL), and the partners are aiming to build it in Singapore for pilots of public flights in the second half of this year per earlier reports.

Volocopter Co-Founder Alex Zosel said in a press release, “Receiving the commercial license for air taxi aircraft is a question of time not possibility. We are thus focusing on shaping the necessary ecosystem around UAM [urban air mobility] including air traffic management, city regulation, and the take-off and landing infrastructure. It takes visionary partners like Skyports and Brandlabs willing to make investments to actively shape the future of urban air mobility.”

Zosel added at the time, “Once regulation comes through on the aviation and city level — and this will be sooner than most think — we will be ready to take off.”