Aiming to leverage the advantages provided by its position as the world’s third-largest civil aircraft manufacturer and the regional hegemon of Latin American aviation, in 2020 Brazilian multinational Embraer established a special-purpose subsidiary, the U.S-based Eve Air Mobility, to establish itself as a future provider of eVTOL solutions in the urban air mobility domain. In the three years since the company’s foundation, Eve Air Mobility has moved swiftly to bring its prototype design to realization and develop the infrastructural capacity necessary to produce and market its product solutions at scale.
The Eve-100 eVTOL design is 100 percent electric powered and achieves vertical takeoff and launch using eight electric propellers, while forward flight uses one or two ducted propellers. The Eve solution accommodates four passengers and a single pilot and will also have the capacity to be utilized as an autonomous flight once a mature regulatory framework for autonomous aircraft emerges. The aircraft features an operational range of 100 kilometers (60 miles). Component testing and the finalization of design elements were reported to be proceeding apace through 2023, with the company hoping to launch flight testing in 2024 and introduce its platform onto the market in 2026.
Over the past two years, Embraer and Eve also achieved a spate of significant infrastructural, regulatory and contractual milestones. In 2022, United Airlines announced a $15 million investment into Eve and outlined plans to acquire as many as 200 of the company’s eVTOL platforms to build capacity for a prospective air taxi operation servicing the San Francisco Bay area.
The pace of major announcements accelerated further over 2023 and early 2024. In June 2023, Embraer and Eve announced formal plans to establish their first eVTOL manufacturing facility in the Brazilian city of Taubaté. Embraer aims to capitalize on its existing infrastructural base in Taubaté to facilitate the new eVTOL site’s development. Eve and Embraer have also begun choosing primary equipment suppliers for the project, most recently selecting aerospace-electronics contractor Crouzet to provide pilot controls for the platform and European contractor Aciturri to support aerostructure development.
In the regulatory domain, Brazil’s National Civil Aviation Agency (ANAC) released its certification basis for the platform in December 2023. Public consultation regarding the certification criteria is poised to conclude on March 15th.
