Not A Plane, Not A Boat — And If The Motors Fail This Fast Electric Seaglider Floats
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A quarter-scale version of Regent’s seaglider. Regent Craft Rhode Island-based Regent has raised $90 million to get its 12-passenger electric seaglider, a low-flying plane that operates only over water, into production by mid-decade. The business jet-like vehicle will travel up to 180 miles at speeds as fast as 180 mph. By Alan Ohnsman, Forbes Staff Electric vertical takeoff and landing air taxis, or eVTOLS, could be an exciting new way to zip around urban landscapes someday and have soaked up billions of investment dollars. But exactly when they go into commercial service and how much rides in the copter-like vehicles will cost isn’t so clear. Billy Thalheimer, who worked on eVTOLs for Boeing’s Aurora Flight Sciences and spacecraft at Blue Origin and Virgin Galactic, thinks a different type of battery-powered aircraft can get to market faster and be more affordable for passengers: seagliders. Resembling futuristic business jets, they’ll take off from ordinary waterfront docks, first operating like boats on hydrofoil stilts over the water at 40 mph or 50 mph. Once they reach open areas they lift off and fly about five to 10 meters above the water. His startup, Regent, is testing quarter-scale prototypes and aims to be in production in about three years, with commercial units ferrying passengers between Hawaii’s islands or around the Florida coast for an estimated $40 a ride, Thalheimer said. Thalheimer and his Aurora colleague Mike Klinker, a fellow MIT-trained aeronautical engineer, started Regent in 2020 to focus on high-speed coastal travel and have since raised about $90 million, including a $60 million round in October, from Mark Cuban, Peter Thiel (through both his family fund and Founders Fund), Lockheed Martin, Japan Airlines and Hawaiian Airlines, among others. Their initial product, the Viceroy, is designed to carry up to a dozen passengers and two…
Filed under: News - @ November 24, 2023 3:16 pm