The vision of electric vertical takeoff and landing aircraft — eVTOLs — whisking passengers across congested cities has been a staple of aviation futurism for years. In 2025 and into 2026, that vision has begun the slow and complicated process of becoming reality, as several manufacturers approach certification and infrastructure questions that seemed abstract are now being answered in concrete and steel.
The global eVTOL industry has consolidated significantly since its peak funding years. Of the hundreds of companies that raised capital for air taxi development at some point between 2018 and 2023, a smaller cohort of well-funded, technically credible programs has emerged as the realistic contenders for early commercial operations. Among the leading programs: Joby Aviation, Archer Aviation, Lilium’s successor entity, Vertical Aerospace, and — with particular relevance to Latin America — Eve Air Mobility, the Embraer-backed eVTOL developer.
Eve Air Mobility: Brazil’s Bet on Urban Air
Eve Air Mobility, spun out of Embraer’s EmbraerX innovation unit and listed on the New York Stock Exchange, is developing a four-passenger eVTOL with a conventional fixed wing for efficient cruise flight and distributed electric propulsion for vertical takeoff and landing. The design prioritizes range and noise characteristics over the purely multirotor configurations favored by some competitors, reflecting Eve’s focus on urban and regional routes rather than intracity hops.
Eve has secured letters of intent for over 2,800 aircraft from operators including Azul Airlines, Republic Airways, and Halo Aviation — a backlog that, while non-binding, signals genuine commercial interest from established aviation operators. The company benefits from Embraer’s engineering heritage, certification experience, and supplier relationships — advantages that pure-play startups without an aerospace parent cannot easily replicate.
The Certification Gauntlet
For all eVTOL developers, the critical bottleneck is regulatory certification. The FAA, EASA, and Brazil’s ANAC are developing new certification frameworks for powered-lift aircraft — a category that existing regulations were not designed to accommodate. The pace of this regulatory development has been slower than industry optimists hoped, pushing first commercial operations for leading programs into 2026 and beyond.
Brazil’s ANAC has been an active participant in international eVTOL regulatory harmonization efforts, partly due to Eve’s domestic significance and partly because of Brazil’s unique geography — a country where urban air mobility could serve not just congested megacities like São Paulo but also remote Amazonian communities where surface access is limited or nonexistent.
Infrastructure: The Overlooked Challenge
Aircraft certification is only one half of the commercial equation. The other is vertiport infrastructure — the takeoff and landing facilities, charging systems, and passenger handling operations that eVTOL networks require. Several Brazilian cities, including São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro, have identified potential vertiport locations, and Fraport Brasil, which operates several Brazilian airports, has expressed interest in integrating vertiport infrastructure into existing terminals.
The urban air mobility revolution will not happen overnight. But the trajectory is now clear enough that serious infrastructure planning has begun — and that, in aviation terms, is a significant milestone.
