36氪 was informed that Shanghai Volante Aviation Technology Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as “Volante”) announced that it has completed the 100 million yuan Pre-A round of financing in the first half of this year. This round of financing was led by Mingshi Capital and Qingsong Fund. And Weiguang Venture Capital followed the investment, and the old shareholder Shunwei Capital continued to increase its investment. It is understood that this round of financing will be used to promote the R&D, manufacturing and test flight of Volante’s full-scale technology demonstrator, the acceleration of basic airworthiness work, and the exploration and development of the application market.
Founded in June 2021 and headquartered in Shanghai, Volante is an electric vertical take-off and landing (eVTOL) manufacturer dedicated to providing solutions for future air travel. Volante’s core business includes eVTOL R&D design, final assembly manufacturing, operation and maintenance and flight training. At present, Volante’s first full-scale technical verification machine has entered the final assembly stage and is about to roll off the production line.
Volante eVTOL products
The founder and CEO Dong Ming is a senior aviation system expert. He has worked in world-class aviation companies such as AVIC, GE, Rockwell Collins and AVIAGE SYSTEMS. In the development, flight test and certification of major models such as ARJ21 and C919, a large amount of aviation development, airworthiness, management experience and industry resources have been accumulated in the project practice.
Due to the continuous evolution of intercity commuting needs and the development of the concept of “air taxi”, the eVTOL industry has continued to be hot in recent years. In 2021, a large number of eVTOL players will emerge at home and abroad, and there will also be a number of listed companies. Relevant institutions predict that the global eVTOL market will reach about one trillion US dollars by 2040. However, since last year, affected by the global economic environment and the epidemic, there have been some fluctuations in the primary and secondary markets, and domestic eVTOL-related investment enthusiasm has also been affected. In this regard, Dong Ming said: “From a global perspective, there have been a large number of actual orders for eVTOL products, and the industry’s technology and airworthiness maturity are rapidly improving. This is actually a strong market signal. Moreover, our round of financing went smoothly. Completion not only allows us to focus more on things, but also strengthens our belief in ‘to focus’.”
Since its establishment a year ago, Volante has quickly assembled top domestic and foreign experts in various disciplines and systems. The proportion of members with experience in the development of civil aircraft models is as high as 90%, and most of them are from top aviation companies.
In terms of engineering, the Volante team has established a large number of models, software, tool chains and processes required by their respective development systems in various disciplines through scaled prototypes and full-scale technical verification machine projects. The inter-professional management system also It has been tested in practice and laid an important foundation for the next stage of model development. It is reported that the design of Volante’s full-scale technology verification machine has been optimized at the million-core time level, and multiple tens of millions of grid-level models have been established, using a large number of supercomputing resources. At present, it has entered the final assembly stage and will be offline soon. .
It is understood that the Volante eVTOL product adopts a composite wing configuration, which can enable the aircraft to have sufficient cruising speed and range, and its safety features are also more prominent. It is generally believed that the composite wing configuration can greatly reduce the catastrophic failure mode of eVTOL. Combined with its technical performance characteristics, airworthiness, and lower development risks and costs, it can be regarded as a more pragmatic and stable solution in the current technology market. choose.
Volante eVTOL product test chart
At the same time, at the market level, Dong Ming told 36Kr that Volante is discussing future operation models and strategic cooperation with a number of aviation operators, and said that eVTOL has diverse application scenarios and broad development prospects.
Aircraft cannot be separated from airworthiness certification. Some eVTOL companies have chosen the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) airworthiness standards. Volante chose the Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC) as the entry point for airworthiness.
“From ARJ21 to C919, CAAC already has the same airworthiness certification capabilities as its counterparts in the world. In the direction of eVTOL, we also clearly feel the CAAC’s willingness to innovate and make breakthroughs.” Dong Ming continued to say: “Suitable for The core of aviation certification is trust, which is the trust in the capabilities of the research and development unit. The first choice of CAAC is based on our deep understanding of the industry.”
It is reported that Volante also maintains close cooperation with the Civil Aviation Administration of China. In January of this year, Volante became the first eVTOL company in China to sign the Safety Assurance Cooperation Plan (PSP) with the CAAC, and soon submitted the first version of the full-machine function failure impact analysis and certification basic draft, which is the model The verification work has laid a good foundation to jointly build and promote the development of eVTOL, a high-tech industry in my country.
Investor said:
Xia Ling, a partner of Mingshi Capital, said: “Mingshi has had a strong conviction on smart electric travel since its establishment. Invest in the field of electric aviation. With its features of safety, efficiency and low cost, eVTOL will become one of the important modes of transportation in the future. This is also the first time that China has developed simultaneously with Europe and the United States in the field of civil aviation and has the opportunity to catch up. There is no doubt that Volante is the leader in this field today. It still takes a certain amount of time for eVTOL to start to be commercialized on a large scale. The tenacity, focus and enthusiasm of Dong Ming and his team make us willing to be its long-term firm leader. runners.”
Cheng Miaoqi, a partner of Qingsong Fund, said: “At present, there are many technical routes for eVTOL, and the multi-rotor + fixed-wing technical route represented by Volante can provide lift during cruise, save energy, and significantly improve the aircraft’s load and endurance. It is a more stable and pragmatic choice at present. We believe that Volante has the opportunity to become one of the earliest eVTOL manufacturers in China to obtain passenger-level airworthiness certification.”
The partner of Microlight Ventures believes: “Large eVTOLs have high technical difficulties in configuration and power due to their load requirements of 100 kilograms or even more than 1000 tons. requirements. Volante can be bold and innovative while possessing solid underlying technology development and engineering capabilities. As a pioneer in the industry, we are honored to work with Volante to grow along with the entire air transportation market.”
Li Wei, partner of Shunwei Capital, said: “We have chosen to work with technological innovation and economic efficiency. After research and judgment, we believe that this is the best time to deploy passenger eVTOL. eVTOL has the characteristics of high professional and technical barriers. We have our own insights. The team members have experienced the tempering of many types of passenger aircraft, and have specialized research and development capabilities and solid engineering realization capabilities. We see that Volante is developing rapidly with the eVTOL industry chain with the determination of the leader. .”
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