Airplane Assembly Technician Eriksen Digman, of Monterey, works on a Joby S4 electric aircraft at Joby Aviation’s manufacturing facility in Marina, Calif., on Monday, June 24, 2024. Joby plans on using the aircraft as an air taxi service in 2025 that will carry a pilot and four passengers at speeds up to 200 mph. While walking home from school among the redwoods in the remote Santa Cruz Mountains, JoeBen Bevirt, the founder of Joby Aviation, yearned to build a flying car.
Joby’s aircraft is able to fly up to 100 miles on a single charge and travel up to 200 mph. The aircraft uses six propellers and four battery packs, and produces zero operating emissions, company officials said.
The company has plans to bring the aircraft to the Bay Area so people can go for joyrides or short trips for about $250. The plane is considered an “ultralight vehicle” and does not need FAA approval to fly, but is banned from flying over congested areas like busy freeways. Airbus, Boeing and Embraer are also working on electric aircraft and Wisk Aero, which is based in Mountain View, last year became a fully-owned subsidiary of Boeing in a deal worth hundreds of millions of dollars.
Eric Allison, chief product officer at Joby, said the air taxi service the company plans to offer isn’t like any existing air travel. The company has developed an app that pairs passengers with available aircraft and landing sites. The cost of a trip will be a little more than taking the higher-end Uber Black and may cost just a few dollars a mile, company officials said.