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Uber has sold off its air taxi business
As suspected, and following a similar deal yesterday to offload its self-driving taxi technology to autonomous vehicle startup Aurora, Uber announced Tuesday that it has sold its flying taxi service, Uber Elevate to California-based Joby Aviation. Joby already makes electric VTOL aircraft so it is acquiring Uber’s aerial ride-hailing division. Doing so will allow the startup access to Uber’s app infrastructure — and vice versa, essentially integrating their respective ground and air apps — once… (www.engadget.com) More...
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Yep, this is looking like the Dot Com bubble all over again. Uber generated a bunch of hype and is cashing out before the burst.
The WSJ reported today that the Air Force has given Joby a 'safety endorsement' and will contract for additional test flights.
Misleading. They are going to be allowed to TRANSPORT MILITARY EQUIPMENT. Not people. Not civilians. Not air-taxi at all. Just point-to-point EQUIPMENT.
This is NEVER going to fly. No pun intended. To fly HUMANS in our NAS you need a Part 135 license. An unpilot aircraft does not qualify. (It's in 14 CFR). To do so on an unscheduled basis has extra other characteristics that none of this will follow. (Again, see the FARS).
Uber never had an air-taxi service. Joby will never have an air-taxi service. You may disagree with my professional assessment -- if so print this out, nail it to your fridge, and one day if I'm wrong send it back.
I can wait to be proven wrong. I'd be happy if there was such a stupid thing as an "air-taxi" that flew itself and safely transported me to go get some groceries.
But there won't be.
E
FAA CPL-H
This is NEVER going to fly. No pun intended. To fly HUMANS in our NAS you need a Part 135 license. An unpilot aircraft does not qualify. (It's in 14 CFR). To do so on an unscheduled basis has extra other characteristics that none of this will follow. (Again, see the FARS).
Uber never had an air-taxi service. Joby will never have an air-taxi service. You may disagree with my professional assessment -- if so print this out, nail it to your fridge, and one day if I'm wrong send it back.
I can wait to be proven wrong. I'd be happy if there was such a stupid thing as an "air-taxi" that flew itself and safely transported me to go get some groceries.
But there won't be.
E
FAA CPL-H
Unfortunately for the flying electric car business, the weight to power ratio for the batteries doesnt work. Did they really think they could build this, load it with 3-4 people with bags and fly it 50 miles? Autonomously? Under what airspace control? IFR? what would the engine out procedure be? Lots of hype about "disrupting" air travel and "green" technology. Yes a great testbed for new tech, but never was going to work out. Anyway we have this technology, except its a turbine power helicopter which is expensive in its own right.
CFI Jay
CFI Jay
I'd like to see the so-called "ride share" business permeate aviation the way it did the taxi business. Such a venture could open up charter air services to a whole new group of customers.
They "sold it off"? Really? For nothing?
Joby Aviation is nothing also. They have some engineers in the mountains north of San Jose and and office in Munich. "Venture Capital" backed.
Nothing burger.