SkyDrive SD-05: 300 Flights Without a Single Crash on the Path to Certification

The Japanese SkyDrive SD-05 has done what matters to “flying cars” far more than flashy clips: it has logged 300 flights without a single crash since testing began in November 2024. The company was refining not just the aircraft itself but the routines of everyday operation — from the go/no-go call to flying in conditions close to real routes.

SkyDrive calls the SD-05 a multicopter “flying car,” though it is essentially a compact eVTOL — an electric vertical take-off and landing aircraft. The trials went well beyond home test sites: the company has flights in Toyota City, at the Yamaguchi Kirara memorial park and demonstrations at the vertiport in the Port of Osaka. For the industry that is an important distinction — lifting a prototype at a closed range is one thing, gathering data for future scheduling, noise, logistics and ground handling is another.

A week earlier SkyDrive reported that the SD-05 had reached 100 km/h — a speed the company sees as viable for short inter-city and urban hops. That still doesn't make the craft a finished product: ahead lie certification, fault-tolerance checks, pilot training, a maintenance schedule and the question of what a passenger flight will cost. But 300 safe take-offs give regulators far more substance than a polished presentation with a pretty landing.

The competitive backdrop, meanwhile, is getting tougher. Toyota is simultaneously deepening its alliance with America's Joby Aviation: the two have set up a joint venture to prepare series production of electric air taxis. Joby is betting on scale and Toyota's manufacturing discipline; SkyDrive on compactness, Japanese certification and a scenario of short routes through dense urban space.

SkyDrive has moved closer not to science fiction but to the dullest and most necessary stage of all: proving that a flight can be repeated hundreds of times without mishap. For an air taxi, that is worth more than any futuristic design.