Advanced Air Mobility: The Critical Role of Global Collaboration
Morris Plains, NJ, March 12, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — 
photo courtesy of Wisk
How Regulators and Industry Must Work Together to Create an AAM Pathway to Success
A symposium hosted by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) in September 2024 was the largest in the 80-year-old institution’s history.
The 1,300 delegates from business and government across the globe who descended on Montreal were not there to talk about airline travel or any traditional mode of air transport but ways to promote global standards and unity to help accelerate the development of Advanced Air Mobility (AAM).
The Clear Case for Standardization
At the top of everyone’s agenda was determining how to accelerate coordinated regulation through global collaboration to enable this new market to flourish and grow.
photo courtesy of Beta Technologies
As ICAO Secretary General Juan Carlos Salazar stated, “We must prepare for Advanced Air Mobility’s convergence with traditional aviation, creating a globally harmonized framework that encompasses every aspect of these new technologies.”
Worldwide interest and investment have created the need for a synchronized approach to regulation.
With entirely new aircraft and air services in development, described by Boeing’s Future Mobility Engineering Director, Ramy Mourad, as “aviation chapter 3,” there exists the possibility of creating a new, ground-up regulatory framework with unilateral support.
Of course, there is a playbook for this. With a few outliers, existing regulations around the world follow a very similar framework, whether written by the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA), the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) or any of the other major aviation regulatory agencies. With regulators worldwide assessing the best way to address the nascent electric aviation market, the time to coordinate is now.
A cooperation milestone has already been achieved with the June 2024 coordinated publication of guidelines for AAM integration from the FAA and EASA. The FAA issued an advisory circular that creates the foundation for certification of powered lift vehicles, such as electric vertical take-off and landing (eVTOL) aircraft. EASA, meanwhile, updated its special condition for vertical take-off and landing aircraft rules, incorporating mutually agreed-upon requirements with the FAA covering safety-related factors.
photo courtesy of Beta Technologies
Industry and Governmental Collaboration
Roberto Honorato, Head of the Airworthiness Department at Brazil’s National Civil Aviation Agency, highlighted the need for collaboration to include industry, underscoring the “importance of sharing information with the global community.” He said, “I am not talking about proprietary technology the manufacturers own, but the regulatory models that the authorities are considering when they are regulating this new technology.”
Archer Aviation’s Head of Regulatory Affairs and ex-FAA administrator, Billy Nolen, added to the theme, proposing a “regulatory framework where the regulator is able to join us” on the journey to realizing the potential AAM holds.
A Clean Sheet Approach
Encompassing both manned and autonomous air transport, AAM will initially be local in nature (restricted by battery capacity). Featuring an array of new technologies and designs, the predominantly electric aircraft in question are closer to flying computers than traditional aircraft.
Aircraft certification to date has been within an existing ecosystem, driven in part by the evolutionary nature of aerospace development.
Many speakers at the ICAO symposium made the case that AAM is an entirely new sector that requires an innovative, holistic approach. As Michael Cervenka, Chief Commercial and Technology Officer at U.K.-based Vertical Aerospace Group Ltd, stated, there is “no playbook for how to do this.”
photo courtesy of Joby
Risk-Based Regulation
A good example of a risk-based approach can be found in the regulation of small, unmanned aircraft in the last few years. The FAA and EASA have taken this approach to regulating drones, focusing on the operating environment rather than the aircraft or operator. By not relying on old preconceptions of what creates risk, the drone industry has flourished and grown at an astonishing pace.
Giuseppe Scannapieco, Acting Section Manager of the Drones Section at EASA, described their approach to regulating drones, stating that EASA “started out looking at the same criteria for regulation” as for standard aircraft but realized that “we should put at the center of our regulatory framework not the design of the aircraft but the intended operation of the aircraft.”
This meant a “switch from a product-centric approach to an operation-centric approach.” For eVTOL aircraft, EASA have “decided to take the same approach and link the operation with certification of the aircraft.”
Another approach being adopted is learning by doing, also described as the “crawl, walk, run” approach. In the case of AAM, this most likely means starting with rural cargo operations and slowly working up to urban passenger flights.
photo courtesy of Archer Aviation
A Comprehensive Ecosystem
The clean sheet for AAM aircraft certification should extend to the infrastructure required to optimize Advanced and Urban Air Mobility (UAM).
Yousuf Hashim Al Azizi, Senior Director of Airworthiness from the United Arab Emirates General Civil Aviation Authority (GCAA), summed it up perfectly. He stated that the GCAA doesn’t “only look at the eVTOL certification itself,” but the project manages “the whole ecosystem, including infrastructure, the availability of the rules for the airspace and for the vertiport because, to us, it is very important that we make sure that all the streams move with the same pace forward.”
He added that to “end up certifying the eVTOL” with “other key components of the ecosystem lagging behind, then it will be hard even for the eVTOL to be operated.”
photo courtesy of Vertical Aerospace
Safe Integration at the Core
Underpinning all discussions on this topic are safety and security. Meeting the high safety standards passengers are accustomed to will require creating a body of regulation that is harmonious with existing rules for air transport while recognizing the significant differences AAM creates. AAM will only succeed if the safety case is made effectively.
That said, eVTOL aircraft and the services they intend to provide have several unique characteristics that deserve a fresh approach to regulation. The existing aviation framework and risk environment must be recognized and respected, especially as early flight operations will likely use existing infrastructure.
photo courtesy of Joby
Call to Action
Advanced Air Mobility, in its many forms, stands at the precipice of becoming a global reality. Its considerable potential impact will not be realized without significant coordination in both developed and developing nations.
As ICAO Secretary General Juan Carlos Salazar summarized,
“By prioritizing interoperability and harmonization, we can create solutions that transcend borders, allowing innovations in one state or region to benefit others around the world.”
Now, the hard work begins.
Read Full Jetstream Publication
About Global Aerospace
Global Aerospace has a century of experience and powerful passion for providing aviation insurance solutions that protect industry stakeholders and empower the industry to thrive. With financial stability from a pool of the world’s foremost capital, we leverage innovative ideas, advanced technology and a powerful synergy among diverse team members to underwrite and process claims for the many risks our clients face. Headquartered in the UK, we have offices in Canada, France, Germany and throughout the United States. Learn more at https://www.global-aero.com/
Global Aerospace Media Contact
Suzanne Keneally
Vice President, Group Head of Communications
+1 973-490-8588
- Finning to sell 4Refuel - May 8, 2025
- Organogenesis Holdings Inc. Reports First Quarter 2025 Financial Results - May 8, 2025
- Senseonics Holdings, Inc. Reports First Quarter Financial Results - May 8, 2025
