Air taxi startup Volocopter hires ex-Airbus defence chief as next CEO

Lilium NV

08/03/2022 12:30

By Nadine Schimroszik
    BERLIN, March 8 (Reuters) - German air taxi startup
Volocopter is recruiting Dirk Hoke, former head of the defence
and aerospace division at Airbus  AIR.PA   AIRG.DE , to take
over as CEO in September.
    Hoke will succeed long-time Volocopter boss Florian Reuter
and will be tasked with successfully completing the
certification process for the company's electric flying taxis.
    "It's going to be an incredibly exciting but also difficult
time," Hoke told Reuters on Tuesday. 
    The executive, like Reuter, worked at Siemens  SIEGn.DE 
before joining Airbus.
    Volocopter is in a costly race with companies around the
world including Lilium  LILM.O , Joby Aviation  JOBY.N  and
Airbus to have the first flying taxi certified by regulators. It
is aiming to achieve this in around two years. 
    To shoulder the cost of certification, and the associated
construction of production facilities, the company from
Bruchsal, near Stuttgart, is raising more money.
    Just last week, it said it had attracted 153 million euros
from investors. It is now valued at around 1.5 billion euros, 
    "There are still some investors who want to help us
ultimately reach 500 million euros," said the chairman of
Volocopter's advisory board, Stefan Klocke.
    Volocopter is aiming for a stock market listing, though a
little later than originally planned.
    "We want to go public with the images from the Summer
Olympics in Paris," said Klocke, setting 2024 as the target.
    Since its founding in 2011, Volocopter has raised more than
495 million euros from investors including Deutsche Bahn, Intel
 INTC.O  and Mercedes-Benz  MBGn.DE .

 (Writing by Paul Carrel
Editing by Mark Potter)
 ((paul.carrel@thomsonreuters.com))