IIT-Madras-incubated start-up to unveil 1st flying taxi in June
What's the story
IIT-Madras-incubated aerial transportation start-up ePlane Co is all set to unveil its first flying taxi prototype in June. The announcement was made by CEO Satyanarayanan Chakravarthy at the News18 Rising Bharat Summit in New Delhi. He also revealed that the second prototype will be out by the end of this year, while the third one will debut in 2026. Commercial operations will start in two years.
Challenges
Indian start-up ecosystem under scrutiny
The flying taxi announcement comes amid talks about the Indian start-up ecosystem, after Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal compared it with China and its rapid progress in fields like deeptech. Chakravarthy, who is also an aerospace engineering professor at IIT-Madras, said, "We are comparing (ourselves) with China. China in the last 20 years have progressed leaps and beyond. They have progressed beyond the West."
Future outlook
Chakravarthy's vision for India's deeptech future
Chakravarthy, a co-founder of six deeptech start-ups, is hopeful about India's prowess in this field by the decade's end. He stressed on knowing the worth of funding start-ups, saying, "When they step out of (institutions) can we intoxicate them with seed funding? Funding should not be easily available. They should know the value." Seed funding could be addictive if not taken with caution, he warned.