Shift Magazine - May 2021 - 9

Archer is one of
three air mobility
companies that
have announced
plans to go public
via mergers with
special-purpose
acquisition
companies so
far this year.
In congested Los
Angeles, electric
aircraft including
Archer's could take to
the skies by 2023.

company led by former GM executive
Barry Engle. (See story, Page 11.)
" An intermodal offering is the future of
mobility, " says Pam Cohn, global COO of
Hyundai Urban Air Mobility. " Just playing
in one of the different modes, or just playing on the ground, isn't necessarily going
to be the best solution for many cities, and
it also leaves a lot of value on the table for
auto players that could provide a more
holistic offering. "
Such value represents an opportunity
for traditional automakers. Even with sales
of personally owned vehicles remaining
robust, mobility has expanded in recent
years to include ride-hailing, scooters
and now aerial transport, which investors
have recognized with particular fervor.
They pumped $3.8 billion into passenger
air mobility in the first quarter of 2021,
according to PitchBook research.
" Transportation
problems
cannot
be solved with cars alone, " said Asad
Hussain, senior analyst of emerging tech
at PitchBook. " Even with autonomous
cars, we still have congestion, and cities
are requiring a shift to multimodal that
needs to happen. "

country, according to real-time traffic analytics company Inrix, which says congestion cost Los Angeles $8.2 billion in 2019.
Attempts to eradicate traffic jams
include an aggressive push on air mobility.
In December, city officials unveiled a firstof-its-kind initiative to lay policy, infrastructure and consumer education groundwork
that could lead to the arrival of electric
aircraft over the city by 2023. Archer and
Hyundai are among the companies working with the city to pioneer service.
" When you see what's happened
when they add extra lanes on highways,
the latent demand instantly sucks it up, "
Archer's Goldstein said. " In the air, the
beauty is you don't have to build anything. "
In February, Archer received a $1 billion order for aircraft from United Airlines.
Working together, the companies will
explore how passengers might use

regional transportation provided by Archer
to reach Los Angeles International Airport,
where they'd then board United flights to
other cities.
It's a similar scenario to the one global
consulting firm Gartner found unsettling in
a 2017 report titled " Flying Autonomous
Vehicles: The Next Big Thing That Isn't. "
Analysts posited that autonomous aerial
mobility would likely serve society's elite
while everyone else is left behind in a noisy
wake on still-congested roads. Further, it
projected that engineering and regulatory
hurdles would hinder air mobility adoption.
Autonomy remains a far-off development. Most eVTOL companies anticipate
human pilots will remain in control for the
foreseeable future. But Goldstein says the
other technology challenges are solved
see FLYING, p. 10

Toyota invested $394 million in
Joby Aviation last year. The two are
working on vehicle development and
manufacturing plans.

L.A. IS STARTING POINT

Nowhere is that more apparent than in
Los Angeles, whose ribbons of highway
are known for their snarled traffic. The city
has the two most congested roads in the
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Shift Magazine - May 2021

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Shift Magazine - May 2021