Redefining Advanced Air Mobility

Summary

Bloomberg Businessweek – "Redefining Advanced Air Mobility"

Hosts: Carol Massar & Tim Stenovec
Date: November 12, 2025
Guest: Lisa Wright (Founder & CEO, Landings)

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Episode Overview

This episode dives into the rapidly evolving world of Advanced Air Mobility (AAM), spotlighting electric vertical takeoff and landing vehicles (EVTOLs) and the critical infrastructure needed to enable their practical use. Lisa Wright, founder and CEO of Landings, shares insights on how her company is developing a network of "vertiports" — the landing, charging, and operations sites that will support future air mobility. The discussion explores the challenges of infrastructure development, power requirements, regulatory realities, and market adoption, comparing the AAM sector with the evolution of the electric vehicle (EV) industry.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

State of the EVTOL Industry

• Market Snapshot:
  • Archer Aviation's recent stock drop & plans to acquire Hawthorne Airport.
    • "[Archer] said they were buying Hawthorne Airport in Los Angeles, which is super interesting... there's a lot going on in the EVTOL space." (Tim Stenovec, 01:53)
• Test Flights and Commercial Readiness:
  • EVTOLs have begun test flights with pilots; China and Dubai are leading in deployment.
  • "There have been test flights with pilots... in China, there's about, I think, 60 already in the air." (Lisa Wright, 03:00)

Infrastructure Needs and Challenges

• Comparison with EV Cars:

  • Infrastructure is the bottleneck, just as with ground EVs.
  • "You can charge your EV at home, you cannot charge your EVTOL at home." (Lisa Wright, 03:58)

• Scale & Distribution:

  • The promise of EVTOLs is point-to-point travel, necessitating thousands of sites, not just one or two.
  • Focus for Landings is on rural sites first, where land is more available and affordable.

• Flexibility of Vertiport Placement:

  • "We can put them on manufacturing sites... industrial sites, retail locations... logistics centers. They can go on just about any type of real estate that we want where a helipad could go." (Lisa Wright, 04:24)

Use Cases and Adoption Strategy

• Initial Customers:
  • Emphasis on logistics, freight, and emergency services rather than passenger travel at the outset.
  • "We're looking at it first as a logistics and freight issue... [with] heavy drones... smaller aircraft... carry emergency service personnel." (Lisa Wright, 05:12)
• Infrastructure Design:
  • Ports are mainly for charging; landing can occur anywhere a helicopter could land, but charging is only at equipped sites.
  • "If the helipad doesn't have the charging equipment, you wouldn't be able to charge there." (Lisa Wright, 05:42)

Financial & Operational Model

• Cost to Build:
  • Mini-ports: $350,000 (slow charging, minimal facilities, 2 acres)
  • Verteplexes: Up to $3 million (fast charging, training, storage, ~12 acres)
• Business Approach:
  • Similar to American Tower's model with cell towers: secure land options nationwide in advance, asset-light strategy, revenue sharing with landowners.
  • "We're essentially getting options on different pieces of property... we will get the capital to build the vertiports and the energy network and then we're going to share the revenue with the landowner." (Lisa Wright, 06:42)

Power and Sustainability

• Biggest Challenge: Power Supply
  • "Power is going to be the biggest difficulty, similar to data centers. However, we don't require as much energy as a data center. We can use five acres of solar to power one of our vertiports." (Lisa Wright, 07:32)
• Power Solutions:
  • Solar is the main approach; in some places, integration with the grid and battery backup for resilience.
  • "Many of them will be co-located [with solar], trying to connect to the grid in some smaller airports... battery backup system that becomes resiliency for the community." (Lisa Wright, 08:11)

Partnerships, Funding, and Outlook

• Industry Collaborations:
  • Working with major players: Archer, Beta, Joby, Electra, Pivotal, Jetson.
  • "I'm working with all EVTOL companies... and the sport craft companies are Pivotal and Jetson." (Lisa Wright, 08:35)
• Funding Status:
  • Still raising capital for the expansion.
  • "Working on it." (Lisa Wright, 08:50, regarding funding closure)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Commercial Viability:

  • "Whether I pay or not, I'd like to be a customer. Within a year, I believe." (Lisa Wright, 02:50)
  • "I didn't say in the US." (Lisa Wright, clarifying Middle East/China as ahead, 02:56)

• Infrastructure Bottleneck Analogy:

  • "The bottleneck in getting EVs on the ground was actually not having enough charging for them. And you can charge your EV at home, you cannot charge your EVTOL at home." (Lisa Wright, 03:58)

• Vision for Rollout:

  • "We're approaching this in the way that American tower approached it... [by] getting options on the land... asset-light." (Lisa Wright, 06:32)

• On Power Requirements:

  • "We can use five acres of solar to power one of our vertiports." (Lisa Wright, 07:32)

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• 01:38–02:08: Archer Aviation news and market context
• 02:08–03:10: Lisa Wright introduction; test flights, global landscape
• 03:10–03:58: Parallels between EVs and EVTOLs; infrastructure bottlenecks
• 04:18–05:12: Vertiport design and rural focus
• 05:12–05:42: Use cases: logistics, emergency, freight
• 05:42–06:14: Vertiport costs and size
• 06:14–07:19: Asset-light rollout, American Tower analogy
• 07:19–08:11: Power sourcing, solar approach
• 08:11–08:35: Partnering with EVTOL manufacturers
• 08:49–08:51: Fundraising status

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Tone & Style Notes

The conversation balances technical detail and big-picture vision, with Lisa Wright providing clear, confident, and sometimes lighthearted insights ("I like to call myself a land woman"). The hosts maintain a curious, slightly skeptical but optimistic tone, pressing for explanations on timeline, practicality, and industry hurdles.

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In summary:
This episode provides a candid look at what it will take for advanced air mobility to succeed in the U.S. and abroad, focusing less on "flying cars" and more on the essential infrastructure and realistic early use cases that will define the market's first phase. Lisa Wright offers a strategic perspective on how rural-centric infrastructure, solar integrations, and asset-light business models could bring the EVTOL revolution closer to reality.

Transcript

[Host 1]

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[Host 1]

Certain Bloomberg Audio Studios Podcasts Radio news.

[Carol Massar]

You're listening to Bloomberg businessweek with Carol Massar and Tim Stanweck on Bloomberg Radio.

[Tim Stannwek]

Well, you might recall last week shares of the electric vertical takeoff and landing vehicle Firm Archer Aviation fell 8%. That was on Friday. Actually had a pretty bad week, but they fell on Friday after the company reported results. They said they were buying Hawthorne Airport.

[Host 1]

In Los Angeles, which is super interesting. Archer saying it would offer shares at $8 each to certain institutional investors to RA proceeds of 650 million, part of which will be used to fund the acquisition. There's a lot going on in the EVTOL space.

[Tim Stannwek]

Yeah, that's why we have Lisa Wright in here. She's founder and CEO of Landings. It's a company that says it's building a landing and ground operations network for inverted ports for these EVTOLs. She joins us here in our Bloomberg Interactive Brokers studio. Welcome. Have you ever been in an evtol?

[Lisa Wright]

I have sat in one. Actually, I've sat in two.

[Tim Stannwek]

While it was flying?

[Lisa Wright]

No, it was in the ground.

[Tim Stannwek]

Has anyone ever been in one while they're flying?

[Lisa Wright]

There have been. There have been test flights with pilots. I believe Beta made a flight to jfk. It wasn't an evtol it was a sea tall, but it's similar. So there have been passengers, although it's still all in test.

[Tim Stannwek]

When do you think you will be a paying customer of one of these companies?

[Lisa Wright]

Whether I pay or not, I'd like to be a customer. Within a year, I believe.

[Tim Stannwek]

You really believe that in the US Within a year?

[Lisa Wright]

I didn't say in the us.

[Tim Stannwek]

Okay. Where, where in the Middle East.

[Lisa Wright]

In the Middle east, most likely. Dubai is ahead of us. Probably won't get to ride one in China. But they're flying in China. There's about, I think 60 already in the air.

[Host 1]

Listen, I think about, you know, Lisa, what's gone on with the EV space just in terms of cars, right? And part of it is like the infrastructure needed to back it up. And there's been this, you know, kind of push, pull, tug and back, you know, back and forth in terms of cars getting on the road but needing places to char and so on and so forth. We need the infrastructure. And it feels a little torturous that it's been. What do you see in terms of the infrastructure that's needed? Because this is where you guys play in what's needed for this industry to, no pun intended, take off. And then where are we in that process?

[Lisa Wright]

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, exactly what you described is what we were seeing a few years ago when these aircraft were starting to get their flight worthy credit. Creditness. And we said the same like, where are they going to land? Where are they going to charge? And as you know, EVs had a huge problem.

[Carol Massar]

Problem.

[Lisa Wright]

The bottleneck in getting EVs on the ground was actually not having enough charging for them. And you can charge your EV at home, you cannot charge your evtol at home. So that's. That was the basis of us saying we need to build, not just one or two. In order to make this real point to point travel, which is the promise, we have to have thousands.

[Tim Stannwek]

What do they look like and where can you build them? Especially in these places. This land is at a premium, right?

[Lisa Wright]

So. Well, most of the companies right now and the big money is all in cities. My company is focusing most, first of all in rural and rural communities. Yeah. And so the land is less expensive there. But also because vertiports can be. They're very similar to a helipad. They don't require thousands of acres of land. We can put them on manufacturing sites, we can put them on industrial sites, we can put them on retail locations, we can put them on logistics centers. They can go on just about any type of real estate that we want. Where helipad could go.

[Tim Stannwek]

Well, how do you envision the customers of these vehicles using them? Because if I think of high demand routes, they're not necessarily from rural area to rural area.

[Lisa Wright]

Correct. So we're looking at it as a first a logistics and freight issue. So already we can handle, say, heavy drones which can carry freight. We can also there's smaller aircraft that can be flown today that are called light sport craft where you can carry emergency service personnel to an accident. So there's already.

[Tim Stannwek]

So that they can land anywhere a helicopter could land. These ports are really just for charging and taking off.

[Lisa Wright]

Exactly. So they can land in a helipad. But if the helipad doesn't have the charging equipment, you wouldn't be able to charge there. What's the cost? The cost. So ours are fairly small. They range from 2 acres to 12 acres, which is relatively small. The cost for the smallest one is about $350,000. And that has slow charge. It doesn't have fast charge. The verteplexes, the larger ones, which will have pilot centers and training and storage, parking, et cetera, those will cost closer to $3 million.

[Host 1]

So how do you build out responsibly?

[Lisa Wright]

Exactly.

[Host 1]

Because it sounds exciting, but as we keep talking to people in the industry, you know, we're yet to really see it take off in a big way. So. And we've all just kind of been watching this closely for I feel like a few years now. So what is the rollout that you envision?

[Lisa Wright]

Yeah, so we're approaching this in the way that American tower approached it approach cell service. Essentially.

[Tim Stannwek]

This is the REIT that looks at, that owns a lot of the cell towers.

[Lisa Wright]

Exactly. 90 billion market cap, I believe. Yeah. What they did was while everybody was focusing on the cities and getting cell service in the cities as they went out and went across the nation essentially and got options on the land. I know you just were talking about Landman earlier. I like to call myself a land woman. We're essentially getting options on different pieces of property were asset light because we're not purchasing them right now, we're not paying any leases on them. Essentially we will get the capital to build the vertiports and the energy network and then we're going to share the revenue with with the landowner.

[Tim Stannwek]

So we just spoke to John Gitelson of our Bloomberg news team and he talked about two data centers that are in Santa Clara, California that are empty because they're awaiting power. How are you able to get Power to these vertiports?

[Lisa Wright]

Yeah, power is going to be the biggest difficulty, similar to two data centers. However, we don't require as much energy as a data center. We can use five acres of solar to power one of our vertiports.

[Tim Stannwek]

Will there be those acres of solar in this administration?

[Lisa Wright]

Absolutely, absolutely. Solar may not be the priority and there may not be see the public funding for it in the way, but there is still a lot of private money going towards these networks.

[Host 1]

So Lisa, we're talking with Lisa Wright, founder and CEO of Landing. So Lisa, so is solar your power of choice? Like are you guys already thinking in terms of how you build this out that there will be solar, a solar farm as part of it? Indeed.

[Lisa Wright]

Many of them will be co located. We are trying to connect to the grid in some of the smaller regional airports. We can do that, right? We can connect to the grid. It may not be a lot of excess energy. So we're working as well with the communities to provide basically a battery backup system that will use peak demand and becomes resiliency for the community.

[Tim Stannwek]

Just 10 seconds. Are you working with any EVTOL companies right now?

[Lisa Wright]

I'm working with all EVTOL companies. So Archer, Beta, Joby. I'm also working with a short takeoff and landing company called Electra and the, the. The sport craft companies are pivotal. And in Jetson, yes or no?

[Host 1]

You've got your funding already or you're working on it?

[Lisa Wright]

Working on it.

[Host 1]

All right, well let us know. Stay in touch. Yeah. Lisa Wright, founder and CEO of Landings, joining us in our Bloomberg Interactive Broker studio.

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