Hover car concept art drivers#

He added that autonomous aircraft would be necessary to make these flights profitable. “The economics don't work if you put one or two pilots up front, and there’s only one or two people in the back,” Mr Langford said. Mr John Langford, the chief executive officer of Boeing’s Aurora, said it is building autonomous technology for flying vehicles. Other Uber partners, including Embraer and Aurora Flight Sciences, also showed off their work on Tuesday. Karem has military experience, having worked on the A160 Hummingbird and other aircrafts for US troops. Karem’s chief executive officer, Ben Tigner, compared the effort to the hurried production timelines during World War II. Karem, like Uber’s other partners, is trying to build aircrafts for testing in 2020 and commercial operation in 2023.

Hover car concept art drivers#

The company’s design shows four rotors, which can reposition after vertical takeoff to help the winged aircraft fly. Safety or driver-assistance features are no substitute for the drivers responsibility to operate the vehicle in a safe manner. “We’re doing, basically, the opposite of what everybody did for 95 years,” the founder said. Karem’s design includes stiff but light rotors that can operate at different speeds without breaking.

He described the project as “maybe slightly easier than nuclear physics but not by much.” You have to reinvent it,” said Mr Abe Karem, the company's eponymous founder. “Almost everything is wrong in helicopters for what you have to do. Instead, the ride-hailing company is sharing data, and suggesting designs, collaborators and specifications for aircraft, including safety and noise requirements. Uber Chief Product Officer Jeff Holden said onstage at the Uber Elevate conference in Los Angeles that he doubted the name “flying cars” would stick.Īfter all, cars were once called horseless carriages, Mr Holden said. While Uber is not building its own flying cars, the company has released three sets of design ideas as it pushes partners to experiment with new types of vehicles.Įven the name for these new machines does not seem certain. That makes Karem the fifth company working on the project, with its new aircraft called the Butterfly. SAN FRANCISCO - Karem Aircraft, founded by the inventor of the predator drone, said Tuesday (May 8) that it is developing a flying vehicle for Uber’s envisioned network of electric air taxis.