A Seattle-based electric airplane startup unveiled more details about its launch Thursday, and announced plans to continue growing its Chicagoland presence.
Zunum Aero, a startup that's building hybrid-to-electric aircraft designed to take passengers from regional airports with a range of up to 700 miles, said it plans to begin testing flights in 2019 and make flights available to passengers in 2022.
Essentially, Zunum is creating a Tesla for the skies with its battery-powered jet. The idea caught the attention of Boeing and JetBlue, who both invested in the startup.
While not based in Chicago, Zunum has several Chicago ties. Zunum co-founder Kiruba Haran is an electrical engineering professor at University of Illinois, and the startup has partnered with a U of I-led center researching battery density. This year Zunum also hired Rockford-based Waleed Said, an aerospace engineer with 30 years experience, to be its CTO.
Zunum has a development center in the Chicago area, and on Thursday it announced plans to launch a second center. At these centers Zunum is developing its electric propulsion technologies and starting ground tests. The startup plans to have more than 15 employees working out of the Chicago area by the end of the year.
Zunum is looking to address the gap in regional airport travel. The startup plans to take passengers from regional airports up to 1,000 miles apart in its 12-passenger planes. Zunum said it will reduce the cost of regional air travel (a one-way flight from the Boston area to the Washington, DC area would cost around $140, for example), and reduce travel time as many regional airports make for a shorter door-to-door trip for many passengers.
Zunum's flights will have a maximum cruise speed of 340 miles per hour, and produce 80 percent less emissions and noise.
“This aircraft is going to transform how we live and work,” Zunum Co-Founder and Chief Engineer Matt Knapp said in a statement. “We’ve pushed ourselves to challenge conventional wisdom and the limits of engineering to deliver an aircraft of which we are extremely proud -- one that offers efficiency and performance without compromise.”
