Uber reveals flying ambition
Uber’s CPO, Jeff Holden has revealed the ride sharing service UberAir has partnered with NASA and is set to take to the Los Angeles skies in 2020.
Speaking at Web Summit and providing a world exclusive visualisation of the UberAir experience, Jeff announced UberAir has signed a partnership with NASA to work on an air space agreement in order to accelerate its development.
The company also revealed its first LA Skyport – UberAir’s landing stations – partner as Sandstone which has earmarked 20 sites for development.
‘Uber is on earth to radically improve urban mobility,’ Jeff told attendees. ‘Every major innovation requires someone to step in and lead the charge, and that is us. We are partnering with the right people via the Uber Elevator Network to crack the urban air mobility code.’
UberAir will use an all-electric, fly by wire, distributed electric propolusion (DEP) vehicle which will be ‘piloted at first’.
‘Our ambitious target is to make UberAir less expensive than driving your own car,’ said Jeff who suggested that soon after launch using UberAir’s pool riding service will be equal in cost to riding an UberX.
Back on the road, Jeff explained that Uber now has 65 million monthly active riders – ‘we’re still very much in hyper growth’ said Jeff and has made over five billion rides – ‘we are only just getting going’. He told delegates that the aim was to ensure the cost per trip was significantly lower than vehicle ownership – ‘this is a watershed moment,’ said Jeff, ‘we firmly believe it’s the beginning of the end for car ownership.’
