Very Light Jet Air Taxis Were Advanced Air Mobility 1.0 Until the Hype Got Seen as Hubris
Veterans of the VLJ wave in the 2000s urge today's eVTOL pioneers to learn from the trend that failed to change the private aviation game as promised.
There was no shortage of buzz in the early years of the 21st century as pioneers of the so-called very light jets (VLJs) set about revolutionizing the private aviation industry. If that sounds familiar to eVTOL evangelists, it’s because there were some common threads in that trend. There were also some important lessons to be learned from a market trend that never quite lived up to all the hype.
Generally, VLJs were defined as aircraft that had been approved for single-pilot operations and had a maximum takeoff weight of less than 10,000 pounds. Their relatively low acquisition cost and ability to operate into smaller airfields were supposed to make them the proverbial game-changer for the air taxi market.
