A new Dutch start-up, Venturi Aviation, eyes to offer a 44-seat full-electric regional aircraft in eight to ten years. This would make it the biggest electric aircraft available on the market. However, the start-up has many boxes to tick before the concept will become reality. New Dutch electric plane has still long way to go. Venturi held a press event in The Netherlands last week, during which it unveiled a model of its Echelon 01 aircraft. It has a high-wing concept with a T-tail. The long wings themselves have an unspecified but long span, with raked wingtips and a high aspect ratio. Each wing accommodates four electric propellor motors that use electricity from batteries that are positioned low in the fuselage for lowering the center of gravity. The Echelon 01 would have a range of 550 kilometers. Take-off power is 8.700 kW. The cabin offers 44 seats in a two-plus-one configuration, but could also be offered as a private aircraft or a cargo freighter. Its Maximum Take-Off Weight (MTOW) is 45.000 kilograms, the payload is 4.965 kilograms. Venturi Aviation is the brainchild of Joost Dieben and Jan Willem Heinen, who both graduated at Eindhoven Technical University. Since 2020, they have been working on the concept as part of the YesDelft Incubator at Delft Technical University, which is renowned for its aerospace division. The team includes now ten people, many of them also young graduates. During an online presentation, Dieben and Heinen explained that they see electric propulsion as the most sustainable solution for regional air travel. They believe that battery technology will evolve in the coming years so that the right type of lightweight and high-power batteries are available when the Echelon 01 would enter service around 2030. Using cheap electricity instead of expensive kerosene or sustainable aviation fuels (SAFs) would make the Echelon one-third cheaper to operate than a conventional turboprop, said Heinen, at just €0.15 cents per seat per kilometer. An Echelon would cost some €40 million each. Over one billion is needed for the project It was clear from the presentation that Venturi still has a long way to go until it can deliver its first aircraft to the market. Heinen said that he hopes to close the first tranche of some €4.0 million to start up the company and grow it to some 25 staff. More capital injections will be needed in the coming years as research and development of the Echelon 01 will require an investment of “over one billion (euros)”, said Heinen. The company claims to have attracted some backers already, but one billion is a significant amount of money. Venturi hopes to bring Echelon 01 to the market in eight to ten years. (Venturi Aero) The most effort will go into developing the battery technology and the aerodynamics. Venturi says the fuselage and tailplane are based on existing products with fairly standard specifications that could be sourced from suppliers like GKN. The production infrastructure also needs to be established, with Venturi reportedly looking at available space at Lelystad Airport. This is a regional airport that is destined to become a hub for Amsterdam Schiphol but still hasn’t been cleared for opening for political and environmental reasons. Heart and Eviation are a long way up on the road Venturi identified Heart Aerospace and Eviation as other start-ups that are planning to offer full-electric regional aircraft, but Heinen said that both are sold out well into the next decade, which would offer Venturi an opportunity. Sweden’s Heart Aerospace received orders from United Airlines and Mesa for up to 200 electric aircraft, which is developed in partnership with Tecnam. Earlier, Heart got backing from Finnair with an order for nineteen ES-19s, while SAS and Norwegian regional Wideroe also support the project. The 19-seater, which could be stretched for more capacity, should enter service in 2026. Thanks to the investments from United and Breakthrough Energy Ventures, Heart has raised $35 million in capital. Israeli start-up Eviation is about to start its flight test program with its Alice out of its Arlington (Washington State) base and has been doing ground runs last week. The nine-seater has won orders for some ninety aircraft since the launch at the 2019 Paris Airshow but has been completely redesigned since then. DHL ordered a cargo version of the Alice in August. Eviation hasn’t disclosed how much capital it has raised since Clermont Group invested $76 million in 2019.
