InterGlobe Enterprises and Archer Aviation Announce Plans to Launch All-Electric Air Taxi Service Across India in 2026
Strategic initiative to provide an innovative and revolutionary urban transportation solution for the country.
NEW DELHI, November 09, 2023--(BUSINESS WIRE)--InterGlobe Enterprises, India’s foremost travel and hospitality conglomerate and Archer Aviation Inc. (NYSE: ACHR), a leader in electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) aircraft, announced today that they have entered into a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with the goal of partnering to launch and operate an all-electric air taxi service in India, subject to appropriate regulatory approvals and clearances.
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Signing ceremony at InterGlobe headquarters in New Delhi between Group Managing Director of InterGlobe, Rahul Bhatia, and Chief Commercial Officer of Archer Aviation, Nikhil Goel. (Photo: Business Wire)
Rahul Bhatia, Group Managing Director of InterGlobe, and Nikhil Goel, Chief Commercial Officer of Archer, signed an MOU to form a proposed partnership through which the parties aim to provide a revolutionary transportation solution for the country, improving urban mobility with safe, sustainable, and low-noise electric air taxi service that is cost-competitive with ground transportation.
The parties intend to work with select in-country business partners to operate Archer’s aircraft, finance and build vertiport infrastructure, and train pilots and other personnel needed for these operations. The partnership also plans to finance the purchase of up to 200 of Archer’s Midnight aircraft for the India operations.
Archer’s Midnight aircraft is a piloted, four-passenger electric vertical takeoff and landing aircraft designed to perform rapid back-to-back flights with minimal charge time between flights. The goal is for a passenger on an InterGlobe-Archer flight to be able to fly the 27-km Delhi trip from Connaught Place to Gurugram, typically taking 60 to 90 minutes by car, in approximately 7 minutes.
In addition to urban air taxi services, the parties plan to pursue a variety of other use cases for the electric aircraft in India, including cargo, logistics, medical and emergency services, as well as private company and charter services.
Rahul Bhatia, Group Managing Director of InterGlobe, said: "Over the last two decades, InterGlobe has been involved in providing safe, efficient, and affordable transportation to hundreds of millions of Indians across the country. We are excited at this new opportunity of bringing an effective, futuristic and sustainable transport solution by introducing Archer’s electric aircraft to India."
"I founded Archer with the vision to help decongest the world’s largest cities. India is one of, if not the largest opportunity for eVTOL aircraft utilization in the world, as it is home to the world’s largest population of over 1.4 billion people and its largest cities face some of the greatest congestion challenges in the world," commented Archer’s CEO and Founder, Adam Goldstein, "Archer’s all-electric Midnight aircraft is designed to provide a revolutionary transportation solution that can help address these congestion issues."
Nikhil Goel, Chief Commercial Officer of Archer Aviation, added: "At Archer, our goal is to make cities greener, smarter, more efficient places to live. We couldn’t be more excited to be partnering with Rahul and the InterGlobe team to bring our Midnight aircraft to Indian cities and fundamentally transform mobility across the country, with the goal of starting with Delhi, Mumbai, and Bengaluru."
Urban congestion is not sustainable with the World Bank projecting that the urban population will more than double by 2050 with short road commutes taking up to 2 hours in many of the world’s largest cities. Archer’s innovative, state-of-the-art electric air taxis are designed to provide a safe and sustainable, low-noise urban mobility solution for India, as it races towards becoming a $5 trillion economy.
About InterGlobe Enterprises
InterGlobe Enterprises is an Indian travel conglomerate involved in Aviation (IndiGo), Hospitality, Logistics, Airline Management, Travel Commerce, Advanced Pilot Training, and Aircraft Maintenance Engineering. InterGlobe, through its various businesses, employs more than 58,000 professionals across 120+ cities globally. For more information, visit www.interglobe.com
About Archer
Archer is designing and developing electric vertical takeoff and landing aircraft for use in urban air mobility networks. Archer’s mission is to unlock the skies, freeing everyone to reimagine how they move and spend time. Archer's team is based in Santa Clara, CA.
To learn more, visit www.archer.com.
Forward-Looking Statements
This press release contains forward looking statements regarding Archer’s future business plans, including statements regarding the timing of Archer’s development, commercialization, and certification of its eVTOL aircraft, business opportunities, aircraft specifications and performance, duration of proposed routes, and the expansion of Archer’s business internationally. In addition, this press release refers to MOUs that are conditioned on the future execution by the parties of binding definitive agreements incorporating the terms outlined in the MOUs, which definitive agreements may not be completed or may contain different terms than those set forth in the MOUs. These forward-looking statements are only predictions and may differ materially from actual results due to a variety of factors. The risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ from the results predicted are more fully detailed in Archer’s filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including its most recent Annual Report on Form 10-K and Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q, available at www.sec.gov. In addition, please note that any forward-looking statements contained herein are based on assumptions that Archer believes to be reasonable as of the date of this press release. Archer undertakes no obligation to update these statements as a result of new information or future events.
Source: Archer
Text: ArcherIR
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Contacts
Archer Media Contacts
The Brand Amp - Archer@TheBrandAmp.com
InterGlobe Enterprises media contact
Ragini Chopra – ragini.chopra@interglobe.com
