Xpeng launches six-wheeled EV with baby helicopter – and will sell to the public
FELIX PAGE
Chinese firm Xpeng AeroHT will launch a radical six-wheeled off-road truck equipped with a small modular aircraft later this year – for the same price as a top-end Range Rover.
The subsidiary of electric car maker Xpeng will start taking orders for the outlandish Land Aircraft Carrier in the final quarter of this year, making it one of just a few firms globally to offer a ‘flying car’.
The Land Aircraft Carrier is effectively a vehicle of two halves: a rugged, highly capable pick-up truck with a separate, drone-style aircraft attached to its rear, which can be detached at will and piloted at low altitudes for short distances.
The final design is still subject to changes, but Xpeng AeroHT co-founder and vice-president Wang Tan has said “all key tests of the R&D validation phase” are complete and preparations for production are under way.
Speaking to Autocar at CES in Las Vegas, Wang gave an idea of what to expect from the production version of the Land Aircraft Carrier: “The ground module is a very cool offroader, but the performance is way better than other off-road cars because it has three axles and a six-wheel-drive set-up with rear-wheel steering.
“If you’re on a trip and you find a fantastic, gorgeous place, you can park up, release the flying portion and [pilot] it yourself – and you can see a different view that you’ve never seen before.”
“We call it a luxury car,” added Wang, suggesting a price in China equivalent to between £134,000 and £157,000.
The Land Aircraft Carrier will initially be sold only in Xpeng AeroHT’s home country, with its maker targeting annual volumes of around 10,000.
However, Wang added: “We’re an international company, and in the future we will have a big market around the world.”
Xpeng AeroHT is in talks with China’s Civil Aviation Administration about getting the flying module certified for public use, but it hasn’t yet begun discussions with equivalent Western bodies.
AeroHT was founded in 2013 and acquired by Xpeng in 2020. It has developed five vehicles over the past decade and is now at the point of being confident enough to launch one.
Employing nearly 1000 people, some 85% of them in R&D, Xpeng AeroHT is the largest flying car company in Asia, according to Wang.
Wang said that a lot of Chinese car companies have established flying car operat
