Electric taxis are taking off – not with passengers

It was a perfect day for an electric taxi demonstration – even without passengers.

On Monday, an electric plane from Joby Aviation took off from JFK Airport for a tour of the company’s future route to Manhattan. The plane – an egg-shaped cabin, six propellers, an electric motor – headed west along the Brooklyn waterfront before turning north of the city. About 14 minutes after takeoff, it landed at the heliport on West 30th Street, ending its previous flight.

You can tell it was an important moment by the number of comments the assembled government officials made on the 60-year-old television program. The Jetsons. (I counted at least three.) But the demonstration was also a sign of a long way to go before these electric air taxis begin carrying passengers as part of commercial ride-hailing services.

Joby’s plane could carry five people, including a pilot, but for today’s demonstrations, it was a bus. Like every other air taxi provider operating today, Joby is still waiting to receive FAA certification for passenger services. And after years of twisting his way through the controlsThe company is reluctant to predict when it will end.

“The certification process is long,” Bonny Simi, president of Joby’s operations, told me, referring to the Federal Aviation Administration’s final approval of a new type of aircraft. “We are well on the way, we are well on the way, and the FAA has been very successful.”

But when asked when Joby will receive his final certificate, Simi expressed concern. He said: “I cannot speak for them. They explained what has just been established.” eVTOL Integration Pilot Program (eIPP), which is a program supported by the White House that aims to accelerate the safe deployment of electric airplanes taking off and landing in the US, as one of the unknowns here is the successful launch of Joby’s taxi business.

“The interesting thing is what will this eIPP allow in practice?” he said. “So, they wanted it to have some type of commercial. We don’t know yet. We’re working with the FAA to see what that might be. So, TBD.”

Joby is the brainchild of founder JoeBen Bevirt, who founded the company in 2009 and ran it in relative obscurity until the 2020s, when it began announcing major investments. Until now, Joby is he made hundreds of millions of dollars from a variety of vendors, including Intel, Toyota, and JetBlue devices. But it is a complex business, which requires a lot of money on R&D as well to establish creative skills. The company went public in 2021, and since then, its stock has never sold above $20 a share. Joby said a a total loss of about $1 billion in 2025.

Notably, Joby’s first passenger service will not be in the entire US. Later this year, the company plans to is launching its first certified airport taxis in Dubaiin collaboration with the Roads and Transport Authority. The FAA has been more cautious about air traffic control, as far as it knows, than its counterparts in the United Arab Emirates.

“The legal restrictions were a little light, not safe by any stretch of the imagination,” Simi said of the Dubai authorities. “But the whole government leaned in.”

While waiting in administrative purgatory, Joby has to show local authorities and air traffic controllers that its technology is almost obsolete. As a result, the company operated several flights in New York this week, one at JFK and another at a helipad in Lower Manhattan. At JFK, we saw Joby’s taxi take off straight, then shift forward, flying away.

Joby says its air taxis are quieter than helicopters, and because they’re electric, they emit zero emissions. Simi described the sound as “like wind blades” – but you wouldn’t know it, because of the helicopter flying overhead on take off. The goal is to connect Manhattan to JFK Airport in less than 10 minutes, not an hour’s drive. Joby owns the Blade helicopter companywhich operates similar routes, maintaining partnerships with Delta Air Lines and Uber.

Joby has flown more than 50,000 miles over the past nine years, Simi said. The company is one of the few that has demonstrated the ability to switch from vertical to forward flight, and one of the few that uses pilots at its air shows, he added.

“Do you think the FAA would allow us to do this if we were just starting out?” Simi asked. “So, we’re way ahead in terms of the amount of experience we have and the amount of work we have.”

Joby went public in 2021 and recently expanded a security partnership to bring in capital before it begins reviewing commercial projects. The company eventually plans to sell its planes to other operators, including operating its own taxi fleet. In addition to New York and Dubai, Joby has said it plans to fly taxis to Miami and Los Angeles, the finalists for the 2028 Olympics. (Competitor Job Archer Aviation was selected as an official eVTOL partner LA Olympics.)

Will Joby have his final approval in time? That’s the hope, Simi said. And when it runs away, you can just hear it happening – but only briefly.

“It’s just getting loud,” Simi said. “Then you heard it for three seconds. And that’s the loudest noise. And it’s just like a whoosh.”