Kiwis sought for electric air taxis
The aviation company behind the world’s first self-piloted electric air taxi wants to hire Kiwis – but work is needed to make sure there are enough people with the right skills available.
Zephyr chief executive Fred Reid said he met New Zealand universities last year to tell them of the company’s intent to hire locally and ease its reservations about ‘‘availability of talent’’.
As a result, Zephyr had set up graduate programmes with several New Zealand universities to hire young engineering, manufacturing and IT talent. Reid would not name the universities because some programmes were still being developed.
The company has advertised 38 jobs online, including internships. Three are based in New Zealand, and the rest in California, at its parent company Kitty Hawk Corporation’s headquarters.
Zephyr wanted Kiwis for all of the roles and would take them to the US to be trained, Reid said.
The company preferred to hire New Zealanders, but would bring in staff from other countries if it needed to.
Speaking at a transport technology conference in Auckland on Monday, Reid said the manufacturing of Zephyr’s flying taxis could also be based in New Zealand. The company was looking for component suppliers here, he said.
Its aircraft components were currently designed and built in California, but New Zealand was definitely a candidate for a factory.
Zephyr and its flying taxi named Cora hit headlines last week when the company announced it had been testing its unmanned aircraft at a private airport in Canterbury since October last year.
It gained a special licence from the Civil Aviation Authority and the Federal Aviation Authority to build and test the aircraft.
Cora takes off vertically, powered by 12 electric fans. It travels at up to 177kmh.
Reid said Cora could be carrying two passengers at a time in New Zealand in less than a decade, most likely in Christchurch first. He expected to have up to 20 of the aircraft in New Zealand by the end of 2019.
The venture was personally funded by Larry Page, Google cofounder and chief executive of Google parent company Alphabet, he said.
The New Zealand Government cited Zephyr as an example last week when it launched an Innovation Partnerships Scheme to encourage other international firms to set up operations here.