Advanced air mobility developer Volocopter has entered insolvency proceedings, as it pledges to continue its quest for funding.
“Volocopter GmbH filed an application for the opening of insolvency proceedings at the Karlsruhe Local Court on 26 December 2024,” says the company.
“The Karlsruhe Local Court began the provisional insolvency administration the following day and appointed Tobias Wahl, partner, and attorney at Anchor Rechtsanwältegesellschaft mbH, as its administrator.”
The company observes that it has conducted a number of successful funding rounds and claims “one of the lowest burn rates in the industry” amid an “extremely difficult financial environment.”
Still, its recent extensive fund-raising exercises have come up dry, making it impossible to keep operating outside of insolvency.
“Founded in 2011, the start-up company is nearing the finish line to obtain aircraft type certification and launch its urban eVTOL, the VoloCity,” it adds.
The company will keep operating, with an eye to “developing a restructuring concept by the end of February.”
Volocopter’s finances have been of concern since at least April, when it lost its bid to gain €100 million ($104 million) in loan guarantees from the German government.
At that time, chief executive Dirk Hoke said that insolvency was possible. In September Hoke announced that he would step down at the end of February 2025.
Volocopter had intended to launch commercial operations of VoloCity at this year’s Paris Summer Olympics, but had to be satisfied with conducting a series of demonstration flights under a permit-to-fly as security concerns took precedence.
VoloCity flew seven demonstration flights, six of which took place at the newly built vertiport at the aerodrome of Saint-Cyr-l’Ecole and one at the Palace of Versailles.
