# Kitty Hawk (2010 – 2022)

- URL: https://girisimcikafasi.com/en/startup-graveyard/kitty-hawk/
- Sector: Mobility and transport
- Country: United States
- Total funding: unknown
- Cause of closure: Business model failed

## What did it do?

Kitty Hawk was a company developing electric, ultralight aircraft capable of vertical take-off and landing. Its best-known product was the Flyer, a single-seat, eight-rotor craft that required no licence. The company also developed Cora, an autonomous air taxi, and Heaviside, a quieter aircraft.

## Why did it shut down?

Despite a flashy unveiling in 2017, the company never delivered a single vehicle to a customer. In June 2020, after 25,000 flights, the Flyer programme was ended; CEO Sebastian Thrun said they had not found a path to a viable business with the Flyer, and dozens of employees were laid off. The focus shifted to Heaviside, but that project was halted too. In September 2022 the company announced that it was winding down; Wisk Aero, its joint venture with Boeing, carried on.

## The story

A short video released in April 2017 put the dream of the “flying car” back on the agenda. It showed a single-seat craft hovering on battery-powered rotors. Because it had the backing of Google co-founder Larry Page, Kitty Hawk's Flyer immediately made headlines; The New York Times wrote that Silicon Valley had turned the flying car from a fantasy into something real.

The company had been founded in 2010 as Zee.Aero and was run by Sebastian Thrun. Because the Flyer was built under US ultralight aircraft rules, no pilot's licence was needed to fly it. Engineering was led by Cameron Robertson and Todd Reichert; the production version was unveiled on 6 June 2018. At the same time, from March 2018 the company was testing Cora, an autonomous electric air taxi, in New Zealand. In 2019 Cora was transferred to a joint venture with Boeing, which in December 2019 became a separate company under the name Wisk Aero. Also in 2019 the company unveiled Heaviside, designed to be quieter than ordinary aircraft.

The flashy unveilings, however, never turned into a commercial business. On 3 June 2020, after a total of 25,000 crewed and uncrewed flights with 111 vehicles, the Flyer programme was ended. CEO Thrun said they had not found a path to a viable business with the Flyer, and dozens of employees were laid off. The company shifted its focus to Heaviside and unveiled its second version, the H2, in 2022.

In September 2022 Kitty Hawk confirmed in a short LinkedIn post that it was winding down. According to The Verge, in the years since its 2017 unveiling the company had delivered none of the vehicles it had promised; according to Insider's sources, work on the 100-mile-range Heaviside had long since been halted. Wisk Aero, in which Boeing and Kitty Hawk were investors, was unaffected by the decision.

Kitty Hawk's story shows that a powerful backer and an impressive technical showcase cannot on their own create a new category of transport. As long as the questions of regulation, infrastructure and price for flying vehicles went unanswered, technical progress did not turn into a business model.

## Lessons

- If you are creating a new category of transport, map out the regulatory, infrastructure and pricing road map alongside the technical showcase.
- A single powerful backer's capital buys time but not market proof; validate your first paid use case early.
- When closing a product programme, moving the team and technology into a partnership that can create value is one way of preserving what you have built.

## Sources

- [Kitty Hawk Corporation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kitty_Hawk_Corporation)
- [Larry Page's flying car startup Kitty Hawk is shutting down](https://www.theverge.com/2022/9/21/23365557/kitty-hawk-larry-page-electric-vtol-shutdown)
- [Kitty Hawk abandons its Flyer project, lays off dozens](https://www.theverge.com/2020/6/4/21280676/kitty-hawk-cancels-flyer-evtol-drone-aircraft-hoverboke-layoffs)
- [Google co-founder’s flying car startup is winding down](https://www.cnbc.com/2022/09/21/google-co-founders-flying-car-start-up-is-winding-down.html)