Toyota has put $394 million into a company that wants to ferry city commuters through the air. In January 2020, Joby Aviation announced a $590 million Series C round, and the Japanese carmaker supplied most of it as lead investor.
Joby is based in Santa Cruz, California, and was founded in 2009 by JoeBen Bevirt, who also started the consumer accessories maker of the same name. Its aircraft is a piloted electric vertical take-off and landing machine, an eVTOL, that the company says can reach 200 miles per hour and cover more than 150 miles on one charge. Because it runs on an electric drivetrain with multiple rotors, Joby says it is “100 times quieter than conventional aircraft during takeoff and landing.”
That noise claim matters to anyone who lives under a flight path, and it is a big part of why air taxis are pitched for crowded cities. Joby has also argued that for short hops it can eventually beat helicopters on cost, to the point of being “accessible to everyone.” For now that is a promise rather than a price list.
Who else is in the round
Bloomberg reported that Baillie Gifford and Global Oryx joined Toyota in the round. Earlier backers also took part: Intel Capital, Capricorn Investment Group, JetBlue Technology Ventures, SPARX Group and Toyota AI Ventures, Toyota’s own investment arm. With the new money, Joby’s total funding reached $720 million, which Bloomberg said made it the best-funded eVTOL startup in the field.
Toyota also gets a say inside the company. Shigeki Tomoyama, an executive vice president at Toyota Motor Corporation, joined Joby’s board. The carmaker’s manufacturing experience is expected to help Joby build its aircraft.
Akio Toyoda, Toyota’s president and CEO, framed the deal as a long-held ambition. “Air transportation has been a long-term goal for Toyota, and while we continue our work in the automobile business, this agreement sets our sights to the sky,” he said. He added that Toyota hoped to give customers “freedom of movement and enjoyment” on land and, now, in the sky.
Where the aircraft stands
Joby had finished sub-scale testing of its design and started full flight tests of production prototypes. It began the certification process with the US Federal Aviation Administration at the end of 2018.
Joby was not alone in the race. TechCrunch listed China’s EHang and Airbus among the firms building similar craft for short city trips carrying people or cargo.
Texas was watching closely too. Dallas Innovates noted that Toyota’s North American headquarters is in Plano, and that Dallas-Fort Worth was one of three first markets Uber picked for its Uber Elevate air-taxi initiative, with Frisco set to host the first Uber heliport.
Sources
- Follow the Money: Toyota Invests $394M in Air Taxi Maker, TestFit Nets $2M Seed Round, Transplace Makes Acquisition (Dallas Innovates)
- Joby Aviation raises $590 million led by Toyota to launch an electric air taxi service (TechCrunch, Darrell Etherington)
