Participants in the capital increase include Honeywell, Aciturri, the Liechtenstein private bank LGT and its associated impact investor Lightrock, Tencent, B. Riley Securities, and affiliated companies. Lilium's new CEO, Klaus Roewe, and the three board members, Barry Engle, David Wallerstein, and Niklas Zennström, are also participating in the capital increase.
"We are pleased to have such a high-caliber group of backers in a challenging macroeconomic environment. We expect these proceeds to strengthen our balance sheet and advance our commercialization efforts, including signing customer contracts with upfront payments, reaching agreement with EASA on our means of compliance, and commencing assembly of the type-compliant aircraft for the final manned flight test campaign,"
says Lilium CEO Klaus Roewe.
"Honeywell and Lilium share a common vision of the importance of electric aviation and the positive impact it will have on air transport and decarbonization. We are proud to partner with Lilium as a supplier of the avionics systems, flight controls, and electric motors used to control and propel Lilium's revolutionary electric jet,"
supplemented Stéphane Fymat, Vice President and General Manager of Urban Air Mobility, Honeywell Aerospace.
First supply contracts for Lilium
Lilium was founded in 2015 out of the Technical University of Munich and is developing a so-called eVTOL aircraft that takes off and lands fully electric vertically. Last year the startup through a merger with a special purpose acquisition company (SPAC) on the US technology exchange Nasdaq. The air taxi company secured approximately 496 million euros (584 million dollars).
In recent months, the company has attracted attention primarily through letters of intent to purchase its jets. Among them are Saudia, the national airline of Saudi Arabia, which plans to purchase 100 Lilium jets; the ASL Group plans to establish an air transit network in the Benelux countries with six Lilium jets; and Helity Copter Airlines plans to operate five of the aircraft in Andalusia. Globeair also plans to operate 12 of the jets in southern France and Italy. The startup plans to begin production of its vertical takeoff aircraft next year.
