Bringing electric Air Taxis to Italy - Atlantia, Aeroporti di Roma, and Volocopter

Volocopter the infrastructures’ holding company Atlantia and Aeroporti di Roma, the largest airport operator in Italy, announced their partnership today to bring electric air taxis to Rome. Alongside the Italian Civil Aviation Authority (ENAC) and ENAV, the companies are pushing for sustainable innovation in aviation. 

Urban air mobility will be part of the solution for heavily congested city centers across the world. As an entirely new mobility service, it offers transportation for people and goods that is battery powered and thus emission free in flight. Together with the Italian authorities and regulators and with Atlantia’s full support, Aeroporti di Roma, and Volocopter will raise public awareness about UAM and pave the way to bring it to Italy within the next 2-3 years. In particular, the new service will connect the international hub "Leonardo da Vinci" with various places in Rome, through vertical airports. This will allow to travel in comfort and quality, reducing greatly both the congestion of urban traffic and CO2 emissions, as the 18 engines of VoloCity operate in electric mode. 

Rome is one of the first cities in Europe to commit to bringing urban air mobility services to their citizens with Volocopter. Paris committed to a collaboration to bring electric air taxis to the city in time for the 2024 Olympic Games. 

Volocopter takes a holistic approach to UAM by developing a full ecosystem that connects the necessary components to offer electric flight in cities. The German company is the only eVTOL developer with a product portfolio of multicopter and fixed-wing designs that can be used for passenger and cargo transportation. Through cross-industrial partnerships, Volocopter covers all the aspects of the UAM ecosystem including the aircraft, the operations, as well as the digital infrastructure, VoloIQ, enabling large-scale digital visibility of the entire ecosystem. 

Aeroporti di Roma is a leader in sustainable airport operations, with the clear goal to be NetZero by 2030. Recognized by UNWTO as Leaders in Responsible Travel and voted Best Airport by ACI Europe for three years in a row, the company has fully integrated sustainability into its business model to create economic, social, and environmental value, believing that the aviation sector can and must contribute to a change. From an industrial and technological point of view, ADR is strongly committed to the development of the new vertical airports and, more generally, to the rapid spread of UAM. In this perspective, UAM is regarded as a form of mobility reshaping the boundaries of flights and airports as we know them today.  

Atlantia - one of the main holding companies at global level specialized in strategic investments in the airport and motorway sector, as well as in the development of new forms of sustainable mobility - is the main shareholder of Aeroporti di Roma and Aéroports de la Côte d'Azur and has recently invested in Volocopter, together with other major international companies. The development and promotion of businesses integrated with environmental sustainability and technological innovation represent one of Atlantia's main strategic lines of growth. 

“We are confident that the collaboration between ADR and Volocopter can give rise, in the short term, to important innovations from the industrial point of view. These two companies are strongly focused on the development of sustainable businesses and have a strong technical expertise. As Atlantia, we will continue to support the diffusion of Urban Air Mobility in our international hub in Rome and in our airport system of Nizza, Cannes and Saint Tropez, proud to be developing a new transport technology that we can then export to our other European airports, as well as on a global scale,” said Carlo Bertazzo, CEO of Atlantia. 

“We have proven again and again that our aircraft are flying fully-scaled. Now, we are currently focusing on putting the UAM ecosystem in place in several cities, just like Rome, to host our fully electric mobility solutions upon certification,” says Christian Bauer, Chief Commercial Officer of Volocopter. “There could not be any better partners to bring this exciting mode of mobility to Italy than ADR, who are recognized to be one of the most innovative and sustainable airports in Europe.” 

Marco Troncone, Chief Executive Officer at Aeroporti di Roma says: “We are proud to contribute to shaping the future in collaboration with Volocopter, one of the most advanced developers for this new type of aircraft and service: this partnership testifies to ADR’s commitment towards sustainability and innovation, as well as to our will to be pioneer in designing the smart mobility of the future upon these premises.” 

The VoloCity will be exhibited at Fiumicino Airport from 27 to 30 October 2021 and from 2 to 4 November 2021 in Piazza San Silvestro in Rome, Italy. These exhibitions will help the public learning about electric air taxis, seeing how this new kind of mobility will improve urban life, and experiencing it by sitting in the VoloCity.