FlyBlade India (BLADE India) is a joint venture involving Hunch Ventures, a privately held New Delhi investment firm and BLADE India, an offshoot of Blade, the technology-powered urban air mobility (UAM) platform while Eve is an accelerated start-up for the UAM ecosystem backed by Brazilian planemaker Embraer. The two have announced a joint venture whereby BLADE India has agreed to purchase 200 electric vertical take-off and landing (eVTOL) vehicles from Eve, together with service and support, and Eve’s Urban Air Traffic Management (UATM) software solution.
Initially, companies plan to collaborate on a three-month pilot project connecting passengers using helicopters. As pioneers in the provision of short-haul air mobility services in India, BLADE India will act as Eve’s on-ground knowledge partner to create the Urban Air Mobility (UAM) ecosystem. The data collected through BLADE India’s customer experience and operations will be used to further develop Eve’s eVTOL, service and support solutions, and its UATM software. BLADE India will initially underwrite 50,000 hours of flight time per year using Eve’s eVTOL in the country.
“India’s traffic congestion woes are only expected to get worse. This partnership allows us to leverage Eve’s deep expertise in not just EVA (Electric Vertical Aircraft) design but also in the infrastructure required to support UAM,” said Amit Dutta, managing director, BLADE India. “This initial order will allow us to enter into service in India and further develop the ecosystem according to the community’s needs. We look forward to offering the people of India a zero-emission UAM solution in the future that will be quiet, efficient, and accessible,” said André Stein, co-CEO of Eve.
