Aerospace supplier Honeywell is offering its expertise to speed the certification of what could be the U.K.’s first electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) air taxi.
Manufacturer Vertical Aerospace on Thursday announced it significantly expanded its partnership with Honeywell in a strategic move to greenlight two critical systems for its four-passenger VX4 eVTOL. The partners will collaborate to certify the VX4’s aircraft management system, which includes Honeywell’s Anthem flight deck, and flight control system, built using Honeywell’s compact fly-by-wire system.
Vertical also selected new, Honeywell-designed inceptors for its production aircraft, which it said will improve pilot safety.
“We wanted to partner with an established, credible technology company that also had certification experience,” Michael Cervenka, president of Vertical, said in a statement. “The fact that Honeywell had just formed a dedicated [urban air mobility] business was also important.”
Vertical intends to certify the VX4’s management and flight control systems to the same standard as commercial airlines—one catastrophic system failure per one billion flight hours. The U.K.’s Civil Aviation Authority (CAA), working with the European Union Aviation Safety Union (EASA), set that standard. The CAA is the primary certification authority, although American Airlines has invested in Vertical and preordered up to 250 aircraft.
The VX4 is designed for zero-emission operations at a cruise speed of 150 mph (130 knots). Its capacity and range of 100 sm (87 nm) make it suitable for regional passenger and cargo transport, corporate travel, emergency medical services, and defense operations. The model has an estimated noise output of 50 dBA during cruise, allowing it to blend into a city soundscape. Vertical says it has about 1,500 preorders.
The company has twice delayed the VX4’s certification timeline, from 2024 to 2026. The aircraft suffered a crash in August 2023, pushing crewed tether flights to the following year. Since then, it has completed more than 30 untethered, thrustborne, crewed flights and shifted to wingborne testing. But in November, it postponed the model’s entry into service by two years to 2028.
Also in November, Vertical unveiled its “Flightpath 2030” blueprint. It set the ambitious goal of delivering at least 150 aircraft to customers and achieving an annual VX4 production rate of 200 by the end of the decade. The company’s medium-term goal is to churn out 700 units per year. It believes its contract with Honeywell will generate $1 billion in value if it hits those targets.
The partners’ relationship dates back to 2019, when they signed an initial agreement for Vertical’s use of Honeywell’s fly-by-wire system and flight control software. The following year, Vertical selected the Anthem flight deck. Now, it plans to install Honeywell’s new inceptors in the VX4’s cockpit. The state-of-the-art hand controllers are designed to improve safety by giving pilots more precise and intuitive control over the aircraft.
“We designed our inceptor to be the lightest and most compact in the industry, and we could not be happier that Vertical is the launch customer for this new technology,” said Rich DeGraff, president of control systems for Honeywell Aerospace Technologies.
Working toward its 2026 certification timeline, Vertical is now conducting wingborne flight testing. Its goal is to roll out a third VX4 prototype and begin full-scale, piloted testing—putting the aircraft through real-world paces—by the end of the year.
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