2.39 million drones sold on Taobao! Can “air taxis” support a trillion-dollar market?

Go to Taobao, buy a house, a car, and a plane...

Available online, priced at 2.39 million

In 2024, along with the “humanoid robots ”, the “low-altitude economy” was also included in the government work report for the first time.

On March 18, EHang Intelligent Technology (NASDAQ: EH), a leading domestic urban air traffic company, launched the EH216-S unmanned manned aircraft on Taobao. The official guide price is 2.39 million (the same as the guide price on the official website), which attracted widespread attention.

According to the details page, the EH216-S is the world's first manned unmanned eVTOL aircraft to obtain a type certificate and a standard airworthiness certificate, designed to address the increasing traffic congestion and pollution in cities, and is equivalent to an "air taxi". Therefore, the product's selling points are mostly based on keywords such as "intelligence", "cluster", "safety" and "interaction".

The EH216-S has a fuselage height of 1.93m and a width of 5.73m. The entire aircraft adopts a streamlined fuselage. The wing doors adopt the classic gull-wing door design of a sports car and the wings can be folded, which can effectively reduce resistance and footprint. It is also 100% pure electric drive.

Judging from the parameters of a maximum passenger capacity of 2 people, a maximum design speed of 130km/h, and a cruising range of 30km, this manned drone is only suitable for short-distance transportation in the city, but it can also meet most urban transportation needs.

In just 4 days, Ehang’s smart Taobao store gained 11,000 fans with zero transactions, achieving the achievement of “10,000 visitors in the past week”.

The store also has a long-range eVTOL aircraft, the VT30, which has a maximum range of 300km and a maximum flight time of 100min, suitable for long-distance flights. The Taobao page of this manned drone sells it for 9999999. However, according to customer service, the VT30 has not yet been officially sold, and it is more of a product display and popular science, reflecting Ehang's closed loop of urban air traffic scenarios.

In addition, Ehang Intelligent has also done something fancy, playing with live streaming to sell goods. On March 20, it jointly opened a "Make Friends Live Room" with Taobao, and launched a limited-time promotion of 1.99 million yuan. However, as of press time, the store's transaction volume is still zero.

"The purpose of joining Taobao is to popularize the scene applications and future development of unmanned aerial vehicles to more consumers, so that more people can understand the changes and impacts of the low-altitude economy on life consumption."

As Ehang said, the opening of the online ToC channel is more for publicity and popular science purposes. The price of millions is destined to make the positioning of manned drones similar to that of luxury cars. For a long time in the future, they can only revolve around the "niche light luxury" circle, and their main audience is still professional operators.

"The first drone stock" has suffered losses for seven consecutive years, and the concept has soared

EHang Intelligent was founded in 2014 and listed on Nasdaq on December 12, 2019, becoming the world's first listed urban air mobility company.

Before going public, Ehang Intelligent completed four rounds of financing, including a B round of financing of up to US$42 million (approximately RMB 300 million). It was only eight months later than the A round of financing of US$10 million (approximately RMB 70 million). The valuation increased 100 times in 16 months, with an astonishing speed of attracting money.

However, there has always been controversy surrounding Ehang Intelligent, because the company has been in a state of "burning money" and losses since 2017. Even in 2023, when the annual revenue increased by 165% compared with 2022 and exceeded 117.4 million yuan, the loss was still 302.3 million yuan while the loss continued to narrow.

However, after the main product EH261-S aircraft successively obtained the type certificate (TC) and single-aircraft airworthiness certificate (AC) in 2023, it brought a strong linkage effect, and the company's delivery and new orders increased significantly. In the fourth quarter of 2023 alone, 23 aircraft were delivered, exceeding the full-year delivery volume in 2022, and the total profit reached 26.6 million yuan, a year-on-year increase of 260.9%, achieving a single-quarter operating cash flow turn positive.

In terms of new orders, EHang has been reporting good news since the fourth quarter of 2023, and has successively announced that it has won hundreds of orders from Shenzhen, Guangzhou, Wuxi, the United Arab Emirates, etc. If it maintains this good momentum, EHang may be able to turn losses into profits soon.

What reacts even faster than revenue is the stock price.

On March 18, Ehang Smart Taobao's stock price soared after it listed aircraft. It once rose by nearly 30% during the trading session and finally closed up 0.85%. It also led to the continued rise of low-altitude economic concepts, and concept stocks such as Rice Information and Zongheng Shares were close to the daily limit.

As of press time, EHang Intelligent's closing price on March 20 was US$18.54, with a high of US$18.90. The transaction volume on that day was US$54.22 million (nearly RMB 400 million), and the total market value exceeded US$1.1 billion (nearly RMB 8 billion).

Last words

The so-called low-altitude economy refers to various economic activities carried out in the low-altitude airspace within 1,000 meters, including various low-altitude flight activities such as drones and manned aircraft, as well as the manufacturing, operation, infrastructure and other links of the upstream and downstream of the relevant industrial chain.

Therefore, the low-altitude economy has a broad radiation area. It not only replicates the traditional general aviation industry, but also integrates new low-altitude production service methods supported by drones.

In this vast low-altitude economic landscape, the most eye-catching is the eVTOL flying car. Compared with traditional aircraft, eVTOL does not require the laying of super-long runways, has less noise, and is more suitable for flying over community centers. It will become a powerful tool to solve urban traffic congestion and realize the new model of "air taxi" in the future.

The report predicts that by 2050, the urban air mobility market will reach US$9 trillion, and the Chinese market will be as high as US$2.1 trillion.

At this year's two sessions, the government work report for the first time clearly included "low-altitude economy" in the scope of strategic emerging industry development. This marks that the low-altitude economy has officially risen from a conceptual issue to the level of national development strategy, which fully demonstrates that the government attaches great importance to the development of this field.

However, compared with existing industries such as automobiles, the low-altitude economy is still a new track with good prospects but lagging development. If manned transportation is to be carried out at the city level, it is necessary to expand the opening of low-altitude airspace resources. The "Interim Regulations on the Management of Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Flights" officially implemented in January this year has opened up policy space for the development of the low-altitude economy.

In order to realize the normal operation of the business model, the deployment of ground infrastructure, operation and dispatching platforms, and emergency response systems also require the coordinated support of government departments.

Driven by favorable policies and the broad prospects for industry development, the low-altitude economy and eVTOL fields have attracted more and more attention from capital and enterprises in recent years.

In addition to Ehang Intelligent, companies including Xiaopeng and Geely Wofei Changkong have entered the eVTOL track. Xiaopeng Huitian completed a US$500 million Series A financing in October 2021, and obtained a total credit line of 6 billion from several state-owned banks in 2022; Wofei Changkong also completed a round A financing of over 100 million yuan in June last year.

In addition to automobile manufacturers, general aviation companies are also making efforts in the field of eVTOL. According to incomplete statistics, there are more than 200 companies in the world currently developing more than 420 types of eVTOL aircraft, and aviation manufacturing giants such as Boeing and Airbus have entered the market.

On the one hand, this craze stems from the attraction of industry development prospects and expected returns. On the other hand, it is also due to the fact that companies are unwilling to "miss out" on this "revolution" that will change the future of travel. After all, no company is willing to be turned away from a trillion-dollar market.

Therefore, out of a sense of safety, quite a number of companies would rather invest heavily and make arrangements first than lose the opportunity in this "sunrise" industry.

As more and more companies and capital enter the market, the entire eVTOL industry is showing an arms race of positioning and development. Faced with many links such as product development and certification acquisition, the competition has already begun. Who will have the last laugh?

Some experts have analyzed that it will take at least 10 years before eVTOL aircraft can achieve large-scale operation in urban air traffic.

This time span may be far behind the expectations of some optimists. However, in the longer term, with the acceleration of social development and urbanization, the demand for efficient and convenient transportation will only increase day by day, and this future may not be that far away.