Xwing (aviation)

Xwing is an autonomous aircraft company founded in 2016, initially focusing on cargo operations.

The company was founded by Marc Piette, who was previously involved with Locu. Its CTO is Maxime Gariel. It received a $4 million seed round in 2018 led by Eniac Ventures, and a $10 million Series A in May 2020 led by R7 Partners, also including funding from Thales Group.[1][2][3][4] Its staff also includes Earl Lawrence, formerly at the FAA in unmanned aircraft and aircraft certification.[5]

In 2020, the company performed a four-hour fully autonomous flight, and was performing gate-to-gate autonomous operations in February 2021.[6][7][8][3][9] In October 2022, the company announced NASA's Aeronautics Research Mission Directorate awarded a contract to share data and study autonomous flights in the national airspace.[10][11][12]

Xwing operates N101XW, a Cessna 208 Caravan under an experimental license with its Superpilot autonomous system.[13][14]

The company acquired Airpac Aviation, a cargo feeder.[15]

The company acquired Martinaire, another cargo feeder, in 2022.[15][7]

References
  1. Wildes, Michael (7 April 2022). "Xwing Says The Future of Air Transportation Is Autonomous, But How Close Is That Future? - FLYING Magazine". FLYING Magazine. Retrieved 29 September 2022.
  2. Korosec, Kirsten (31 July 2018). "Autonomous-aviation startup Xwing takes flight with $4 million in funding". TechCrunch. Retrieved 29 September 2022.
  3. Barber, Gregory (20 August 2020). "This Plane Flies Itself. We Went for a Ride". WIRED. Retrieved 29 September 2022.
  4. Pasztor, Andy (20 August 2020). "To Build a Plane That Can Fly Itself, Start With a Pilot in the Cockpit". WSJ. Retrieved 29 September 2022.
  5. Kelleher, Suzanne Rowan (26 February 2023). "No Pilot, No Problem? Here's How Soon Self-Flying Planes Will Take Off". Forbes. Retrieved 28 February 2023. Earl Lawrence knows a thing or two about FAA regulations, having recently left the agency, where he was the head of aircraft certification. Prior to that, Lawrence had started the FAA's unmanned office. "One of the key things of bringing this category of aircraft to the cargo market is that we are not changing the rules. We are following the regulations," he says, noting that some companies in the space have made proposals that do not comply with FAA regulations. "That's what significantly slows things down."
  6. Sumit Singh (2 April 2022). "How Xwing Is Bringing End-To-End Autonomous Flight". Simple Flying. Retrieved 29 September 2022.
  7. Brett, Damian (29 July 2022). "Xwing expands cargo fleet as it continues push for autonomous flying - Air Cargo News". Air Cargo News. Retrieved 29 September 2022. The company has demonstrated fully autonomous gate-to-gate capabilities since February 2021, including the ability to autonomously taxi on and off the runway successfully while navigating various obstacles and operations on the ground.
  8. Thomas Pallini (8 May 2021). "I flew on a self-flying plane where pilots sat back as the aircraft taxied, took off, and landed on its own and I'm convinced it's the future of aviation". Business Insider. Retrieved 29 September 2022.
  9. Hanneke Weitering (13 October 2022). "Human in the Loop: My Ride on Xwing's Self-flying Aircraft". FutureFlight. Retrieved 13 October 2022.
  10. Wildes, Michael (13 October 2022). "NASA Awards Xwing Contract to Develop Autonomous Flight Safety Management System - FLYING Magazine". FLYING Magazine. Retrieved 14 October 2022. Xwing will share flight and ground operations data, algorithms, and pertinent autonomous subject matter expertise with NASA. In turn, NASA researchers will use the information to develop a safety management system (SMS) where regular pilotless flights can be integrated into the NAS.
  11. HANNEKE WEITERING (13 October 2022). "NASA Contracts Xwing To Study Safety of Autonomous Flight Operations". FutureFlight. Retrieved 14 October 2022.
  12. Niki Britton (13 October 2022). "NASA, Xwing to develop autonomous flight standards". aopa.org. Retrieved 14 October 2022.
  13. Altman, Andy (2022-10-02). "I Got to Ride in a Self-Flying Cessna". CNet. Retrieved 2022-10-02.
  14. Xwing (19 October 2020). "Delivering PPE and school supplies to the Navajo Nation — autonomously". Medium. Retrieved 2 October 2022. N101XW being tugged out
  15. Giacomo Amati (30 July 2022). "Xwing Increases Air Cargo Services To 400 Weekly Flights". Simple Flying. Retrieved 29 September 2022.
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