Boeing has teamed up
with luxury sports carmaker Porsche to develop a concept for an
electric vehicle capable of vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL) -- in
other words, they're working on a "flying car." The companies' engineers
will even collaborate to build and test a prototype based on the design
they'll come up with, which will most likely be a premium VTOL model to
stay true to Porsche's brand.
Their collaboration will also look into urban air mobility as a whole
and won't just focus on the development of a vehicle. Porsche's
announcement says they'll create an international team as part of the
Memorandum of Understanding they signed. That team will address the
various aspects of urban air mobility, as well as investigate the market
potential for and possible use cases of premium flying vehicles.
"This
collaboration builds on our efforts to develop a safe and efficient new
mobility ecosystem, and provides an opportunity to investigate the
development of a premium urban air mobility vehicle with a leading
automotive brand," Boeing VP Steve Nordlund said in a statement.
As Reuters noted, Boeing will be competing with perpetual rival Airbus SE, which already started testing its own VTOL vehicle last year. Larry Page-backed Kitty Hawk also recently unveiled a single-person VTOL that's a hundred times quieter than a helicopter.
