Built and assembled in Burlington, Vermont, the Alia CX300 has already been ordered for 20 units for a medical operator.
Last November, American electric aircraft developer Beta Technologies made the maiden flight of its aircraft, the Alia CX300.
The approximately hour-long flight was operated by Kyle Clark, founder and CEO of Beta, who took the CX300 to an altitude of approximately 7,000 feet. He was then able to evaluate the handling qualities of this propeller device but also to evaluate its stability and control.
A Vermont company
The aircraft was recently assembled at Beta’s production facility in Burlington, which opened about a year ago. Beta says the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) inspected it before granting it a Special Airworthiness Certificate for Experimental Research, which allowed it to complete this test flight.
The aircraft manufacturer will shortly launch a flight test campaign with the production aircraft, which will continue for 50 hours under its experimental certificate.
Subsequently, a market survey and crew training certificate will allow Beta to fly this aircraft outside of Burlington and train other pilots.
“We’re not just building an airplane company, we’re building and refining a system to produce high-quality airplanes efficiently,” says Kyle Clark. This first step allowed the team to collect data and information on manufacturing labor, tool design, yields and sequences, all information used to refine our production systems. »
Already an order book
In October, Beta announced it had raised $318 million in its Series C fundraising campaign, led by the Qatar Investment Authority – the Gulf state’s sovereign wealth fund. Fidelity Management & Research, Rise Climate and United Therapeutics also participated in this campaign as investors.
The recent test flight brings the company closer to its goal of delivering aircraft to its customers. Last November, Beta Technologies received an order with a deposit for up to 20 aircraft from medical operator Metro Aviation.
Ambulance planes today, commercial airliners tomorrow?
