Aircraft legend Abe Karem, renowned for his drone work that’s transformed warfare, said he is sure the technology in his electric-powered air taxi “Butterfly” will be a success, potentially revolutionizing the way people scoot around major cities in peacetime.
His Lake Forest-based aerospace development company, Karem Aircraft Inc., has been working on its vertical takeoff and landing technology for about 14 years, primarily for defense contractors.
The company will soon be spinning off a new firm for civilians. It’s looking to make an electric battery-powered VTOL air taxi that will transport passengers—think of a flying Uber ride—at a reasonable price.
Karem, now 82, shook up the military world with designs completed in the mid-1990s that evolved into the Predator, an unmanned drone used in the U.S. war on terrorism; it’s now “the world’s most feared drone,” noted a 2013 profile in Air & Space Magazine, mentioning there were some 8,000 vehicles in operation.
In addition to the Predator, he also developed the military’s A160 Hummingbird unmanned helicopter.
More recently, his company has been partnering with San Francisco-based Uber since May of last year for the development of an all-electric aerial ride-sharing program.
“It will be successful in being a good aircraft,” Karem, nicknamed the “dronefather,” told the Business Journal on Aug. 1.
“But I can’t assure you it’s going to be more successful than the others in the market. If I was, I would be arrogant.”
His new venture has raised $25 million in a Series A investment from South Korea’s Hanwha Systems, part of a major industrial conglomerate with aerospace and defense units.
Technical Successes
The renowned aerial designer and entrepreneur emphasizes that in his more than 50 years in aviation, none of his teams have ever met failure on the technical side. And he is looking for the same sort of win this time.
Karem Aircraft, with about 55 employees and growing, makes manned and unmanned rotorcraft vehicles mainly for the military. The company said it will continue to serve the needs of its military customers, emphasizing: “We are confident that each company is on a path for long-term success.”
The latest plan is to make a passenger-friendly adaptation of Karem’s core military-focused technology to shorten commutes and avoid traffic in densely populated cities with vehicles that are significantly quieter, safer and less costly than helicopters.
The Butterfly design uses Karem’s optimum speed rotor technology to power a flying vehicle with four large rotors mounted on the wings and tail. The Butterfly configuration solves the trade-off between hover and cruise efficiency, while its large, slow turning rotors provide lift and lower noise needed in cities.
Hanwha’s investment in Karem’s air taxi entity “accelerates efforts to bring the Butterfly to market, and we look forward to flying riders in places like Dallas, Los Angeles, and Melbourne in the near future,” said Uber Elevate head Eric Allison in a statement released by Karem Aircraft mid-last month.
LA 2023?
The air taxi firm is the fourth new company started in the U.S. by Karem; the first and second were acquired by General Atomics and Boeing, respectively.
Karem Aircraft was founded in 2004; Karem will split his time between the two businesses, serving as chief designer for both.
Uber has six vehicle development partners, said Ben Tigner, chief executive of the spinoff company.
“Uber hopes that we all will be successful in delivering vehicles to them,” he said. “There will be multiple folks who are successfully delivering vehicles.”
The other companies working with Uber include Bell, Boeing’s design subsidiary Aurora Flight Sciences and Embraer, Tigner said.
The Korean funding, which is subject to regulatory approval, will let them “hit the accelerator,” said the spinoff’s Chief Commercial Officer Ryan Doss.
Uber said it hopes that Los Angeles will be one of the sites for its new aerial taxi service as early as 2023, along with Dallas-Fort Worth and Melbourne.
New Facility Planned for Flying Taxis
Karem Aircraft is spinning off a new company to develop an electric-powered air taxi with Uber.
Ben Tigner, chief executive of the as-of-yet unnamed new venture, said it will start off in its current Lake Forest building—a roughly 36,000-square-foot facility just off Bake Parkway—and then move to another building nearby in the next few months.
The company’s recently announced $25 million investment from a Korean company, subject to regulatory approval, will let them speed up work on the air taxi, and likely ramp up hiring.
Tigner said in an interview this month that company co-owner Abe Karem still provides the “central spark” for the air taxi, though he “doesn’t provide all the innovative genius.”
Karem Aircraft said it will continue to serve the needs of its military customers, emphasizing: “We are confident that each company is on a path for long-term success.”
Congestion Questions
Skeptics might ask whether flooding the skies with electric taxis will create air jams over major cities, but Tigner said that issue is already being worked on by Uber, NASA, the Federal Aviation Administration, and other industry representatives.
Chief Commercial Officer Ryan Doss said it makes sense to him and his colleague to proceed as a “small, nimble company” wielding significant power, though they are “certainly cognizant” of the tendency toward consolidation in the aerospace industry.
“Our target is for the service to cost the same as an existing car-based ride-share trip—such as UberX—for the same distance, although unlike an UberX, the fare will be per seat,” Doss said.
Baghdad, Israel, Tustin
Abe Karem was born in Baghdad to Jewish parents in 1937, two years before the outbreak of World War II.
In 1951, the family emigrated to the fledgling state of Israel, where he started building model airplanes at age 14 and becoming intrigued with aviation.
“That doesn’t mean that I was not interested in girls, but I was interested in aircraft even more,” Karem said.
“I had a wonderful time there. It was the young Israel.”
The former chief designer for the Israeli air force immigrated to the U.S. in the late 1970s.
He said he came to the U.S. and was offerred a job designing ships for the Navy.
“But I wanted to do aircraft and the best place to do aircraft is Southern California,” he said.
Karem lives in the Tustin area and is at work in the office seven days a week, according to company officials.
He owns Karem Aircraft with his wife, Dina.
