Brazil's Embraer plans to build electric flying taxi factory near Sao Paulo
bbc.com
bbc.com
https://www.nytimes.com/2000/02/15/world/sao-paulo-journal-r...
Talk about an underpriced externality.
They probably know where the costs are. Maintenance and fuel I guess... And electric VTOLs are far cheaper on these two.
They offered helicopter rides to one of Rio's major airports and charged R$100 per passenger (according to him, that's an accurate estimate of future prices once they make their eVTOL) at a loss just to see if there was demand. They got booked the entire year in advance.
Rio de Janiero is a bit larger than Moscow, Paris and Guangzhou yet each have at least 5x the metro infrastructure.
As they say in there, "Brazil is the country of the future and it will always be, never the country of the present". This taxi looks like a Brazilian future: always coming, never present.
Embraer is skilled, but the manufacturing industry in Brazil is in decline. Besides, most of the money in the country is flowing into smaller towns in the countryside, following agricultural boom. Not too much need for helicopter taxis in there.
Disclaimer: I am a "viralata", a Brazilian that ran away from the country.
That's an understatement, they're a top 3 if not even top 2 aircraft manufacturer in the world.
I'm not entirely convinced in the electric taxi model's financial viability, but Embraer are certainly capable of manufacturing them.
And that merge wasn't Embraer "throwing the towel": Bombardier, Embraer's direct competitor, partnered up with Airbus, getting a critical competitive advantage. It was only natural for Embraer too seek a similar partnership.
They didn't "partner up". They gave up their modern design (C-Series) to Airbus, then had a fire sale of the remaining assets like the CRJ series, all due to Boeing sabotage. Apart from Bombardier, Boeing are the other big losers from the whole debacle, because Airbus got a very good and modern design for "free" (assumes liabilities).
> After reassessing its participation in January 2020, Bombardier exited the A220 programme in February 2020, selling its share to Airbus for $591 million. Airbus thus owned 75% of the programme; the remaining 25% of shares were held by Investissement Québec. Under the acquisition terms Airbus acquired Bombardier's option to buy out Investissement Québec's share from 2023, with a revised option date of 2026
That's pretty much giving it (majority control) up for free, and the rest for very cheap.
> Embraer would be in trouble to compete with Airbus anyway.
To an extent, but the E2 and the C-Series aren't really in the same segment - one is a regional jet, the other is a short to medium haul one. The Embraer E2s have less capacity and range than the A220, being optimised for shorter and less dense routes, and they have absolutely zero competition in the market today.
It appears that Bombardier took some other financial aspects in consideration before they made that decision. I have no further knowledge, and that would be more than I'm willing to research for this discussion. Besides, this is tangential to the Embraer x Bombardier debate.
> but the E2 and the C-Series aren't really in the same segment
Indeed, but there's some overlap between the largest E2 and the smallest C-Series, while the E2 is much cheaper.
Boeing offered to buy Embraer outright at first, Brazil’s regulators balked at handling over the family jewels, so they came up with an 80% Boeing joint venture for the commercial division. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing–Embraer_joint_venture
Basically a buyout by another name.
(I'm not counting COMAC because they're a decade behind and will focus on the Chinese market first, and UAC (Russia's various design bureaus) has been crippled by sanctions).
Yes, indeed. You are basically doubting that Embraer can manufacture and sell airplanes.
I would understand some doubts about the technology or overall acceptance. But plainly doubting their capacity to build and sell things is ridiculous.
Really honestly, I could tell that before I finished your second paragraph. I see people around the world criticizing their own countries quite often, but afaik only Brazilians take the criticism to such a self-depreciative level.
I think Brazil suffers from being a country where some segments of the population can’t find a relatable national identity. I feel very strongly about my state identity (I’m a gaucho from Rio Grande do Sul) to the point I’d probably support secession if that was a serious possibility, but I’ve never felt anything positive about being Brazilian.
Funny enough, 10 years later and now a US citizen, I don’t speak so negatively about Brazil anymore. Turns that that over time I found out I’m a bit more Brazilian than I thought, despite former efforts to not be one. Also, there are things I miss about living there, at least compared to living in the US. If it wasn’t for the still insane crime rates, I’d consider moving back for a season.
What possible difference could change that status quo? We have commodity helicopters right now, but very few people commute anywhere by helicopter.
In any case, when talking about startups, both Lilium Aviation (Munich) and Volocopter (Bruchsal) got actually flying prototypes into the air [1], and they're led by actually competent former Airbus people.
[1] https://www.sueddeutsche.de/projekte/artikel/wirtschaft/flug...
E.g. - I _plan_ to marry Ariane Grande.
If Embraer really do launch this drone taxi service someday, it will be only to boost it's image as an aviation/inovation company, not because it would be profitable (it probably wouldn't, and it will not happen in the end).
If Tom Cruise really do get engaged to Ariana someday, it will be to boost his image as a man's man, an action star that get all the ladies (he probably never enjoyed the fruit very much, and it will never happen in the end).