Coming soon: Small plane that can land in your backyard

The two-seater entirely electric plane uses ducted fan which makes it much simpler, quieter and safer than conventional helicopters. “Our goal is to develop an aircraft for use in everyday life. We are going for a plane that does not need the complex and expensive infrastructure of an airport,” said Daniel Wiegand, CEO of Lilum, the company hosted in a European Space Agency (ESA) business incubator.

“To reduce noise and pollution, we are using electric engines so it can also be used close to urban areas,” said Daniel, one of the four Munich University graduates who founded the company. Highly efficient in its cruising mode, the plane will have a range of 500 kilometres and will be on sale by 2018. 

It features a touchscreen and fly-by-wire joystick controls, retractable landing gear, wing doors, large storage, panoramic windows and a battery that can be recharged from any wall plug. “The half-size prototype is already flying and now under test. The full-size unmanned prototype is planned for this summer,” said Thorsten Rudolph, CEO of AZO, which runs the incubator, one of many in ESAs Technology Transfer Programme throughout Europe. 

“In the longer term, our target is to build an aircraft that not only the super-rich can afford, and that can make private air transportation possible for a much wider number of people,” Daniel said.