Air taxi manufacturer Volocopter has filed for insolvency at the Karlsruhe Local Court in Baden-Württemberg, Germany. The application was filed on 26 December and will see Anchor Rechtsanwältegesellschaft mbH partner and attorney, Tobias Wahl.
This announcement follows the miraculous recovery of Lilium, yet another German electric air taxi startup. A consortium of European and North American investors is set to acquire the company’s subsidiaries, enabling it to cancel its insolvency plans. Before this announcement, Lilium ceased operations and laid off 1,000 employees.
Insolvency proceedings of Volocopter
The company has announced that it will require additional financing within eight weeks to support its mission to bring about an eVTOL innovation. Numerous successful financing rounds have driven its development and operations in the past. Notably, the company raised $182 million in November 2022 and $170 million in March of the same year to commercialise its aircrafts.
With one of the lowest burn rates in the industry, Volocopter has successfully operated in an extremely difficult financial environment. However, despite recent intensive fundraising efforts, finding a viable solution to maintain regular operations outside of insolvency proceedings has not been possible.
Business operations will continue as usual during the provisional insolvency proceedings. The provisional insolvency administrator has now held a staff meeting to inform employees about the current situation and answer initial questions about the proceedings.
Eyes to make urban air mobility a reality
Founded in 2011 by Stephan Wolf and Alexander Zosel, Volocopter aims to make urban air mobility a reality. It has a lineup of aircraft models, including VoloCity, VoloConnect, and VoloDrone. These models operate with varying speed ranges from 90 km/h to 250 km/h. Notably, Volocopter has committed to launching commercial air taxi services in cities like Singapore, Rome, Paris, and the NEOM region.
Dirk Hoke, CEO of Volocopter, said, “We are ahead of our industry peers in our technological, flight test, and certification progress. That makes us an attractive company to invest in while we organise ourselves with internal restructuring.”
Having initiated an investor process, Tobias Wahl said, “The company needs financing to take the final steps towards market entry. We will endeavour to develop a restructuring concept by the end of February and implement it with investors.”
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