SkyDrive
Japanese eVTOL and cargo drone company developing electric air taxis and unmanned cargo aircraft for Japan's advanced air mobility market.
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SkyDrive
SkyDrive is a Japanese eVTOL and uncrewed cargo drone company headquartered in Toyota City, Aichi Prefecture. It is developing a small electric air taxi for commercial passenger operations, alongside a cargo drone aimed at logistics for remote and island communities. It is the eVTOL developer furthest through the Japanese certification process.
Key Products
SD-05: Two-seat eVTOL aircraft targeting Japan’s domestic air taxi market, with type certification pursued through Japan’s Civil Aviation Bureau. Designed for tourist, regional transport, and urban mobility applications.
CV-02: Unmanned cargo drone targeting remote island and mountainous logistics routes where conventional transport infrastructure is limited or absent.
Certification Progress
SkyDrive is further through the Japanese certification process than any other dedicated eVTOL developer in the country. The Japan Civil Aviation Bureau issued its G-1 certification basis in February 2025, and the two sides agreed a general certification plan for the aircraft in March 2026. On 17 April 2026 SkyDrive received Approved Design Organization certification from the Aircraft Engineering and Certification Center, the first dedicated eVTOL developer in Japan to hold it.
The company has said it aims to enter service in 2028. That is a company target, not a certified date.
SkyDrive flew demonstration flights at the Osaka-Kansai Expo site in April 2025, over roughly a month, and in May 2026 it launched a consortium with partners for vertiport operations building on the Expo work.
Business and Funding
SkyDrive is private. It raised ¥8.3 billion in pre-Series D funding through a third-party allotment led by MUFG Bank, with investments from Suzuki Motor Corporation, East Japan Railway, Kyushu Railway and other companies. It said cumulative funding after that round exceeded ¥43 billion.
Suzuki is its official production partner, and manufacturing of the aircraft began in March 2024 at a Suzuki plant in Japan. The company completed Japan’s first crewed eVTOL flight demonstration in 2020.
Why It Matters
SkyDrive is the Japanese eVTOL developer most directly tied to the country’s government-backed advanced air mobility timeline, and its certification milestones are real regulatory progress rather than announcements — the ADO approval and an agreed certification plan are the parts of the process that competitors most often stall on.
The Suzuki relationship is the other structural advantage. Most eVTOL developers have to build a manufacturing capability from nothing while simultaneously certifying an aircraft; SkyDrive is producing in an established carmaker’s plant. The open question is the same one facing every eVTOL company: certification progress is not demand, and a 2028 service target still has to survive the gap between a certified aircraft and a route that pays for itself.
