Our mission

We use technology to reduce the cost of air travel.

Heart Aerospace ES-30 electric aircraft banking over a coastal archipelago in bright daylight

Our mission

Heart Aerospace is a modern aircraft company with a clear mission: to lower the cost of commercial aviation.

Cost is the gateway to progress in aviation. Lower-cost aircraft can make air travel more accessible to consumers, help airlines open and sustain more routes to more communities, and accelerate the global transition to cleaner flight.

We are pursuing that mission through technology: electrification, software, and modern manufacturing. Together, these capabilities enable a new generation of aircraft designed for the efficiency the future of aviation requires.

Heart Aerospace X1 prototype inside the hangar — wing and propellers seen from below in bright daylight

Three technology levers drive lower costs.

  • Electrification

    Electric propulsion and electrified aircraft systems reduce operating cost through cheaper energy and simplified maintenance.

  • Software & autonomy

    Software-defined aircraft reduce lifecycle cost by improving reliability, streamlining updates, and enabling automation.

  • Modern manufacturing

    A modern manufacturing approach reduces unit cost through a next-gen production system built for scale.

Broken economics are killing short-haul connectivity.

IATA head on fuel shock.

“Unfortunately, I think there will be some carriers that will find this high fuel ​price very difficult to cope with," Walsh told Reuters at IATA's annual summit in Rio de Janeiro, adding he expects some airlines to ⁠go out of business and others to be acquired by larger carriers."

Reuters
npr

"The declines are due to a mixture of factors, including reduced passenger demand during the pandemic, a pilot shortage, and increased costs for fuel, labor and maintenance."

National Public Radio
The Wall Street Journal - The Fuel-Price Crunch That’s Turning Into a Disaster for Airlines

“The carrier is analyzing each route — even each departure — looking for flights that won’t cover their costs at higher fuel prices.”

The Wall Street Journal
The Guardian - Europe’s smaller airports ‘under threat’ if fuel shortages cause many cancellations

“The current levels of jet fuel prices and the prospect of a new cost of living crisis mean that many regional airports across our continent are likely to face both a supply and demand shock. For them, this is nothing short of an existential threat.”

The Guardian
USA Today

"Airlines bidding for EAS contracts usually have to plan to operate at least two daily flights to the subsidized community on 30- or 50-seat aircraft. In 2025, the DOT spent nearly $690 million on EAS grants."

USA Today
Bloomberg - The Jet-Fuel Surge Is Making Global Flight Connections Disappear

“'Any flying that we’re doing that’s on the margin, maybe not producing the yields we’d like, is likely going to be reconsidered,' Delta Air Lines Inc. Chief Executive Officer Ed Bastian said."

Bloomberg
Axios - Airline industry faces a shake-up as jet fuel hits hard

"Rising fuel and labor costs are squeezing airlines — and pushing higher fares and fees onto travelers already facing economic uncertainty."

Axios
New York Times - Dubuque? We Don’t Fly There Anymore. Airlines Say Goodbye to Regional Airports.

"A 500-mile flight in a regional jet that holds an average of 76 passengers uses about 30 percent more fuel per passenger than the typical mainline jet."

The New York Times
Wall Street Journal - Want to Fly This Summer? Good Luck Traveling to a Small City

"The 50-seat jets that airlines have relied on to serve small cities are being phased out as they get older, replaced by jets with 70 or more seats, which are more cost efficient but exceed passenger demand in some markets.."

The Wall Street Journal
NPR - More small airports are being cut off from the air travel network. This is why

"The 50-seat jet today is just not economic as it was 10 years ago. Labor costs going up. Fuel costs going up. Maintenance costs going up. And it's hard for that airplane at that seat size to be profitable."

National Public Radio

Electric aviation starts with regional travel.

High-demand regional missions are the natural entry point for electric flight, where legacy aircraft economics have left airports and travelers underserved.

Aviation's CO₂ emissions are on track to triple by 2050*

Air travel is remarkable, allowing us to comfortably get anywhere on the planet in less than a day. But as air travel has grown over the past decades, so has its emissions.

Globally, air travel is still only in its infancy. Only 20 percent of the world's population has ever flown on an airplane, meaning there are over 6 billion people worldwide that have never been airborne. As they start to connect to this amazing infrastructure, the emissions will increase exponentially.

* Making Net-Zero Aviation possible · MPP 2022 (opens in new tab)

Aviation CO₂ emissions, 1960–2050 (MPP 2022 baseline)Annual aviation CO₂ emissions rise from about 0.1 gigatonnes in 1960 to roughly 1 gigatonne in 2019, dip to 0.55 in 2020 during the COVID pandemic, then climb sharply to a projected 3 gigatonnes by 2050.Gt CO₂0.00.51.01.52.02.53.01960199020202050~3 Gt by 2050