Chennai: Electric aircraft startup The ePlane Company is raising $50 million from venture capital and strategic investors as it moves closer to certifying its air ambulances in the country.The startup, founded by IIT Madras professor Satya Chakravarthy, builds electric aircraft capable of vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) that can navigate dense urban areas. It is among the early startups backed by the government’s Research, Development and Innovation (RDI) fund, receiving about Rs 285 crore as optionally convertible debt, and is considered the single largest allocation under the country’s ambitious push to spur deep-tech activity. The company expects to close the round within four months by raising capital to match the RDI funding, and has so far secured around Rs 82 crore, Chakravarthy said. In all, it has raised roughly $21 million to date.Speaking to TOI, he said the company had completed assembly of the full-scale prototype of its e200X eVTOL aircraft and is now moving into the physical testing phase that precedes flight. “We expect to complete our second certification-conforming prototype by December, which will undergo its own series of tests, including unmanned flight tests, to ensure it is safe enough for a human pilot to take control from the pilot seat. Air ambulance certification flight testing is expected to run through 2027 and early 2028, targeting air ambulance operations thereafter,” he said.The funding will be used to certify the aircraft, beginning with the air ambulance variant. Chakravarthy added that the company already has expressions of interest and MoUs with charter operators and air ambulance providers, which it expects to convert into pre-orders over the next few months. With a footprint of roughly 8 by 10 metres, the aircraft can operate from existing helipads and tight urban sites rather than purpose-built infrastructure, though the company has begun talks with developers on building vertiports and charging infrastructure.The focus, he said, is on cutting maintenance and operating costs for electric aircraft, which he estimates are around 80% lower, and he believes eVTOL ambulance flights will eventually be affordable enough to be covered by standard health insurance. “The company’s primary goal, or North Star, is to ensure the aircraft is cheaper than existing air ambulances to kickstart the market. Initially, the aim is to position the aircraft’s price at about 80% of the acquisition cost of a conventional air ambulance,” he said. He added that India’s Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) had already taken significant steps toward regulatory harmonisation with other countries and that the company is exploring international certifications.ePlane has a 60,000-sq-ft facility at the IIT Madras campus in Thaiyur, on the outskirts of Chennai, and targets an initial scale of 80 aircraft by 2028 before scaling further. It is also in talks with manufacturing partners. The company plans to launch air taxis and, later, cargo planes that share the same airframe platform. The e200X was designed and assembled in-house, with its major systems—including the propellers, airframe structure, landing gear and battery pack—developed at ePlane’s own facilities. The aircraft was featured in Nvidia founder Jensen Huang’s Taipei keynote for its use of chipsets and edge processors for sensor fusion (cameras and radars) to enable real-time obstacle detection and avoidance, and the company is using Nvidia’s Omniverse platform to build a digital twin of the environment to simulate and test its sensor suite virtually.ePlane received acceptance for type certification from the DGCA last January, making it the first Indian private company to be accepted under the new eVTOL rules issued in September 2024.
