Germany gives eVTOLs another look as ERC unveils heavy-lift cargo drone

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In 2024, Germany’s flagship electric vertical take-off and landing developers, Lilium and Volocopter, both ran out of money after failing in last-ditch attempts to secure government funding. In the midst of his campaign for federal and state loan guarantees, Lilium’s then-CEO, Klaus Roewe, argued passionately for government support.

“There has never been a successful aircraft program in the world that has not been supported by the state,” he wrote in a LinkedIn post that was widely reported on at the time but since deleted. “Does Germany want to buy electric aircraft in the USA and China in the future, just as we historically did with passenger aircraft (Boeing, McDonnell Douglas, Lockheed), because we don’t have our own industry?”

Although skeptics of Lilium and Volocopter blamed the companies themselves for their failures, not the German government, the momentum of the eVTOL industry has undeniably shifted away from Europe as a whole and towards the U.S. and China, where leading electric aircraft developers have received significant government support. Yet Germany’s stance toward the sector appears to be evolving.

At ILA Berlin this week, the country’s second-wave eVTOL developer ERC System made the case for renewed German assistance as it announced a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with Rheinmetall and the State of North Rhine-Westphalia to partner on the development and production of ERC’s new hybrid-electric heavy-lift cargo drone, the Victor U250, which is targeting first deliveries in 2028. Intended to address a near-term defense capability gap, Victor will also further ERC’s ultimate goal of developing a crewed passenger-carrying aircraft, dubbed Charlie.