Aviation: Electric planes: This company wants to revive Germany's regional flight routes

The start-up Vaeridion is building an electric plane for nine people. The Munich-based company is now receiving more than 120 million euros in capital. But passengers still have to be patient.

Berlin. While electric cars are now part of the traffic scene and electric trucks are increasingly on the roads, there are hardly any fully electric aircraft so far. Almost all aircraft currently fly on the fossil fuel kerosene and not on electricity.

The Munich start-up Vaeridion wants to change that. "Vaeridion has the chance to build a global market leader. The question is no longer whether there will be electric planes, but who will lead commercialization," says company boss Ivor van Dartel.

Jack Wang from Berlin-based early-stage investor Project A believes Vaeridion will play a leading role: “I believe Vaeridion can play a similar role in electric aviation as BYD does in electric cars.” Project A invested in Vaeridion shortly after the company was founded.

Vaeridion has now taken an important step forward on the long road to electric aircraft. The start-up, founded in 2021, will receive 30 million euros from investors and funding of 94.5 million euros from the European Commission. This money is earmarked for the construction and commissioning of a final assembly facility at Oberpfaffenhofen Airport near Munich.

It is expensive and takes time to establish electric aircraft on the market

The fate of the two former air taxi providers Lilium and Volocopter shows how costly and time-consuming it can be to establish electric aircraft on the market: one company is insolvent, the other now belongs to a Chinese company. Vaeridion benefited indirectly from Lilium's demise. “We took over our production and testing facility, the battery factory in Oberpfaffenhofen, from the Lilium insolvency,” says van Dartel.

Not everything has been going smoothly at Vaeridion lately either. Raising new venture capital did not proceed as quickly as expected. "Fundraising in this industry is not easy. We do not serve the two popular topics of AI or armaments," says van Dartel.

That's why it's no longer certain whether a maiden flight will take place next year: "We're targeting the first compliant prototype for the end of 2027 or beginning of 2028," he continues. With the new round of financing and funding, Vaeridion can now prepare for market entry.

The round was led by Dutch investors Shift Invest and Invest-NL. Existing investors World Fund, Project A and Vsquared Ventures also took part.

The Vaeridion aircraft is similar to gliders

Vaeridion is developing an electric plane called Microliner that has space for nine people and the crew. The machine is similar to gliders and has a multi-engine propulsion system with a propeller.

The plane should be able to fly around 400 kilometers, allowing routes between Berlin and Bremen or London and Antwerp. If such short distances are covered with conventional kerosene, the flights are considered to be particularly harmful to the climate.

The flight prices should roughly correspond to those of a “first class ICE ticket”. “A flight with us will cost hundreds not thousands of euros,” says the co-founder.

Is there a market for smaller electric planes?

Van Dartel is pursuing one goal with Vaeridion: “We want to revive the regional routes in Germany and with them the 350 airfields that there are.”

Herbert Mangesius, partner at Vaeridion investor Vsquared, believes this is possible: “Large airlines are cutting regional routes, while entrepreneurs are setting up their own airlines just so that their regions can remain accessible.” Vaeridion has the potential to become the European champion of electric regional aviation and directly reconnect thousands of regions, he says.

Van Dartel believes the market potential is great: “The market for electric planes is between 50 and 100 billion euros,” he says. According to investor Mangesius, Vaeridion has already received purchase commitments worth more than 730 million euros.

Vaeridion would like to deliver the first “Microliner” in 2030. The recipient has already been determined. It is the cargo airline ASL from Liège in Belgium.

First of all, the battery system needs to be approved. “We work very well with the authorities,” says van Dartel.

That's the most important thing, explains Project A's Wang. If the batteries and propulsion system are certified, the rest of the aircraft doesn't require an extensive new certification process. That's why the investor doesn't assume that Vaeridion will suffer the fate of Lilium or Volocopter.