Dream of a flying car comes to an end. AeroMobil fails to acquire new financing and closes down
The flying car designed by Slovaks and presented on October 29, 2014 at the Pioneer Festival in Vienna had been a sensation. Its Slovak fathers, Juraj Vaculík and Štefan Klein, had believed that it could be the first step to “changing passenger transport on a global scale”. This never happened. Almost nine years later the company management, after failing to acquire fresh money to continue with R&D, resolved to file for bankruptcy.
“The last negotiations with investors…were not successful,” said the company as cited by the TASR newswire.
For several years, the company unsuccessfully negotiated with several investors to raise capital, including all major manufacturers from the automotive and aerospace industries. AeroMobil attributes its failure to acquiring new investments to the negative mood in the venture capital market, its availability falling by more than 80 percent since April last year; also the markets' distrust of different concepts, such as electric flying devices with vertical take-off and landing. Since its establishment in 2010, AeroMobil acquired about €25 million in investments from all over the world.
Nevertheless, according to AeroMobil management, the flying vehicle project remains achievable, because internal development was not limited by anything except the availability of capital.
“During 12 years, AeroMobil has created and produced three generations of flying prototypes, registered 14 patents, produced digital data enabling the manufacturing of the vehicle, a global brand with high media value, and a viable vision that inspired manufacturers around the world to think about a new way of door-to-door aerial mobility,” the company stated.
Štefan Klein, who left the company in 2016 following diverging visions between him and remaining management concerning the company's further development, regrets the end of AeroMobil.
“With a company that possessed innovation, courage and an erudite team in its DNA strands, I'm very sorry and not happy at all,” said Klein, who is working on a new flying car project, AirCar, as cited by the žive.sk website. “I have a lot of respect for Patrick Hessel and Juraj Vaculík. There are not many people in Slovakia who invest their private resources of millions of euros into new visions.”
