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Source: Times Finance Author: Zhao Yu

The scenes of cars flying over cities in science fiction movies are becoming a reality.

On August 5, Xiaopeng Huitian, an Xpeng Motors ecological enterprise and flying car company, announced that it had received US$150 million in B1 round of financing and launched the B2 round of financing. This round of financing will be used to promote the research and development, large-scale mass production and commercialization of Xiaopeng Huitian's flying cars.

The company revealed that it is about to build the world's first flying car factory that uses modern assembly lines for large-scale mass production in the Guangzhou Development Zone. The factory will first be used to produce the flying body of the split flying car "Land Aircraft Carrier". The "Land Aircraft Carrier" is scheduled to start pre-sale in the fourth quarter of this year.

This year, the low-altitude economy has become a representative of new productivity and was written into the government work report for the first time. A series of policies supporting the development of the low-altitude economy have been introduced across the country, providing strong support for the commercial application of flying cars.

The "Research Report on the Development of China's Low-altitude Economy (2024)" previously released by the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology shows that the scale of China's low-altitude economy will reach 505.95 billion yuan in 2023, with a growth rate of 33.8%. It is expected that by 2026, the scale of the low-altitude economy is expected to exceed 1 trillion yuan.

"Three certificates" become the entry ticket to the flight track

According to regulations of relevant departments, at present, domestic civil aircraft need to obtain three types of certificates: type certificate (TC), production certificate (PC) and airworthiness certificate (AC) before they have the opportunity to enter the civil aviation market.

The three are used to prove whether the design of aviation products complies with relevant airworthiness regulations, whether the manufacturing, testing, and installation of products and components comply with the approved design, and to confirm that each product is manufactured in accordance with the approved design and quality system. It is equivalent to the "household registration book" of the aircraft.

On March 25 this year, the TC application for the flight body of Xiaopeng Huitian's "land aircraft carrier" (code-name: X3-F) was officially accepted by the Civil Aviation Administration of China Central South Region, marking that the model is about to enter the airworthiness certification stage.

Xiaopeng Huitian told Times Finance that before the delivery of the "land aircraft carrier", the flying body and the land body will be certified according to aviation and automobile related procedures respectively. In terms of the difficulty of obtaining evidence, TC is the highest, followed by PC, and AC is relatively the easiest.

Also in March this year, the V2000CG cargo eVTOL (electric vertical take-off and landing aircraft) launched by Fengfei Aviation obtained the TC issued by the Civil Aviation Administration of East China. In addition, many aircraft products under companies such as Wofei Changkong, Volant Aviation, and Shi Technology are also actively obtaining certification.

Capital market heats up low-altitude economic industry chain

As the industry is still in its early stages of development and the investment payback period is long, companies in the low-altitude economic industry chain often require large amounts of capital to support their R&D and operations.

On the one hand, the concentrated entry of capital reflects the huge potential of the low-altitude economy, and on the other hand, it also allows related companies to obtain financial support for sustainable development. During the year, Shi Technology, Volant, Lanyi Aviation, and Fengfei Aviation frequently reported "good news".

In March, Shi Technology completed an exclusive strategic financing of US$20 million in its A round, and plans to create an "air taxi" application scenario in the Middle East. Then in May, Lanyi Aviation announced the completion of its second round of financing after the seed round, raising tens of millions of yuan in total, with investors including government funds, market-oriented capital and listed companies in the industry chain. In July, Volant Aviation announced the completion of a RMB 100 million A+++ round of financing, which is the fourth round of RMB 100 million financing completed by Volant Aviation since 2024. The company also became the domestic eVTOL developer with the most financing rounds in the first half of 2024.

Just two days before Xiaopeng Huitian announced a new round of financing (August 3), Fengfei Aviation announced that it had signed a strategic investment and cooperation agreement with CATL. CATL exclusively invested hundreds of millions of dollars and became a strategic investor of Fengfei Aviation. Fengfei Aviation said that it will work with CATL for a long time to jointly commit to the research and development of eVTOL aviation batteries.

Although the domestic low-altitude industrial chain still has a long way to go before large-scale commercialization, the capital market has already drawn various imaginations for this sky within 1,000 meters above the ground.

Rules, infrastructure, and technology may be difficulties in commercialization

At present, the commercialization process of low-altitude economy is still in its infancy, and pioneers are already exploring various possibilities for commercialization.

In February this year, the five-seat eVTOL aircraft Shengshilong independently developed by Fengfei Aviation completed the first demonstration flight of the world's first cross-sea and cross-city eVTOL route, shortening the one-way ground travel time from Shenzhen to Zhuhai from 2.5 to 3 hours to 20 minutes. In May, its independently developed V2000CG completed a chartered flight at Shanghai Pudong International Airport, and in the future it is expected to shorten the ground travel time from the airport to the city center from 60 to 90 minutes to 10 minutes, improving travel efficiency.

According to Xiaopeng Huitian, the split flying car it developed can realize multiple functions such as flying, road commuting, and off-roading. On the basis of meeting the travel needs of individual users, Xiaopeng Huitian will continue to explore the application scenarios of this product in public business. At the same time, Xiaopeng Huitian is also accelerating the layout of the national flying car application network. So far, it has successfully signed contracts with nearly 60 flight camps, including various types such as general aviation airports, scenic spots, cultural and tourism towns, and urban suburbs.

However, from small-scale product trials to large-scale implementation, companies still need to overcome the challenges brought by technology and the market.

Pan Helin, an economist and member of the Information and Communication Economy Expert Committee of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, listed three pressing issues to Times Finance. First, the rules and standards for flying cars have yet to be clarified. "If the rules are not clear, flying cars are prone to safety accidents. If the standards are not clear, the design ideas of flying cars will be varied, and driver training will become a big problem. If the endurance standards are not clear, the endurance of flying cars will be a problem."

Secondly, the large-scale market entry of flying cars requires a lot of infrastructure support. Ground charging and flight service related facilities, parking lots, navigation, airspace management, etc. all need to be improved.

In addition, the technical safety of current flying cars still has room for improvement. Today's flying cars have configurations such as vector propulsion, multi-rotor and composite wings. In theory, composite wings are safer, but because there is a large gap between the test flight environment and the actual operating environment, their reliability often requires high-intensity use to verify.

Some industry insiders compare flying cars withAutopilotThe two sides compared the commercialization paths of the two technologies, saying that the former is following the path that the latter has taken. For the industrial chain companies standing on the wave, with the joint effect of policy support and capital support, they have the opportunity to explore more possibilities.