Electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) air taxi developer Joby Aviation on Monday announced the completion of its first point-to-point flight in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), which according to the company could be the first location where its flagship S4 flies with passengers.
Joby flew the S4 earlier this month between its test facility in Margham and Al Maktoum International Airport (OMDW) in Dubai—a 17-minute sortie during which it waded into controlled airspace and pilots communicated with air traffic control (ATC). This week, it will be the only eVTOL to fly at the Dubai Airshow, the company said.
Joby also unveiled three new vertiport locations—the Dubai Mall, Atlantis the Royal, and American University of Dubai—to complement its hub at Dubai International Airport (OMDB), which chief product officer Eric Allison said during a roundtable discussion on Friday will be the “centerpiece” of its Dubai network. Per Joby, the airport site is about 60 percent complete and on track for a 2026 opening.
Didier Papadopoulos, Joby’s president of aircraft OEM, said the company is also working with the UAE’s General Civil Aviation Authority (GCAA) to agree upon a “qualification program” in advance of FAA type certification. Under that authorization, he said it is “possible, depending on where things go” that the S4 flies passengers in Dubai in advance of its commercial launch in the U.S.
Discussions with the GCAA are ongoing to determine the exact scope of those operations, Papadopoulos said.
“There is nothing we’re doing that is saying GCAA goes first, FAA goes second,” he said.
Allison compared the qualification program to an aircraft obtaining an experimental market survey certificate from the FAA once mature, allowing noncommercial passenger flights before the S4 takes paying customers. In a statement, the director general of Dubai’s Road and Transport Authority—with which Joby has a six-year agreement to operate air taxis in the emirate—said GCAA is “steadily progressing” toward commercial operations in 2026.
“It’s not quite the same,” Allison said, “but I think that there are some elements of this that are used all the time in aircraft certification projects.”
Air Taxis: From UAE to U.S.
Joby has big plans for the S4 in the U.S., including home-to-airport air taxi services in partnership with Delta Air Lines. It intends to offer S4 trips via an integration with Uber and Blade Air Mobility, whose passenger division it acquired in August.
At the same time, it is conducting “sandbox testing” in Dubai, where its operations “may be a subset of what we intend to do around the world,” Papadopoulos said. There, the S4 will not need to handle flying in cold weather, for example, lowering its barrier to entry.
“We might be thinking about other things relating to the initial tempo of operation, or other things relating to altitudes, for example,” Papadopoulos said. “All these things sort of shrink the envelope that we have to show compliance to here.”
Papadopoulos described a “phased approach” to the UAE, wherein Joby is concurrently validating the S4 and its systems while conducting early operations “that lead into passenger carrying eventually.” So far, it has completed more than 20 out-and-back flights in Dubai, with this month marking the start of point-to-point operations. The next step, Papadopoulos said, will be operations over people and with passengers.
Joby’s ramp-up of UAE operations could impact its work with the FAA. For example, Papadopoulos said, the U.S. regulator could “potentially” count the company’s flying in Dubai’s desert heat toward the S4’s type inspection authorization (TIA)—a critical final phase of type certification. The GCAA, in turn, will accept Joby’s progress in the U.S.
“They’re going to give us credit for everything that we do with the FAA,” Papadopoulos said.
Joby in the U.S. is conducting internal testing prior to for-credit tests with FAA pilots. But the GCAA will be “co-engaged” during that phase, Papadopoulos said, enabling “parallel processing” that could accelerate a finding of compliance in the UAE. He said that the company has discussed the scope and requirements of a qualification program with the FAA and GCAA, though it has yet to determine what testing—or how much—will take place in the U.S. or Middle East.
Depending on the pace and outcome of that testing, the GCAA could allow the S4 to fly with passengers—even before it obtains type certification in the U.S.
“The intent is to get approval for specific operations within Dubai in this case, and that’s why I avoid using ‘type certification’ on purpose,” Papadopoulos said.
Papadopoulos compared Joby’s UAE sandbox testing to the FAA’s upcoming eVTOL Integration Pilot Program (eIPP), which will permit certain trial operations as the regulator works to certify the S4 and other models. That model, he said, is “gaining momentum” in other countries such as Saudi Arabia—another market Joby is targeting for air taxi service.
