Honeywell International Inc. and Vertical Aerospace Ltd. have agreed to work together to solve urban air mobility’s (UAM’s) technical, regulatory and business challenges. Through the partnership, Honeywell Aerospace plans to integrate its current avionics, navigation, fly-by-wire technologies into Vertical Aerospace’s electric vertical take-off and landing (eVTOL) vehicles.

This includes Honeywell Aerospace's new compact fly-by-wire flight system, which provides critical system redundancy needed to meet the safety and certification requirements for eVTOL aircraft. According to Honeywell, the all-in-one system “packs the ‘brains’ of an airliner’s flight controls” into one phonebook-sized unit. With size and weight as key design considerations in aerospace – and even more so for small eVTOL vehicles – this compact fly-by-wire system could be a key enabler for the UAM industry and reduced urban congestion.

Honeywell plans to demonstrate the new system June 11–12 at the Uber Elevate Summit in Washington, D.C.

Read the full article in the Automated & Connected Knowledge Hub.

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William Kucinski is content editor at SAE International, Aerospace Products Group in Warrendale, Pa. Previously, he worked as a writer at the NASA Safety Center in Cleveland, Ohio and was responsible for writing the agency’s System Failure Case Studies. His interests include literally anything that has to do with space, past and present military aircraft, and propulsion technology.

Contact him regarding any article or collaboration ideas by e-mail at william.kucinski@sae.org.