Porsche joins the flying car race, according to report
Porsche, Uber and Airbus are all developing passenger carrying airborne vehicles
Porsche is the latest company to be associated with flying cars, with reported plans for an autonomous airborne passenger vehicle.
Flying cars may seem a long way off but a number of companies including Airbus and Chinese vendor Ehang and coalitions including Daimler and Intel and Uber and Nasa are working on making them a reality within the next decade or so.
The latest car company to reveal high flying ambitions is high-end German sports car firm, Porsche.
Head of sales and marketing and executive board member Detlev von Platen hinted at Porsche's plans to German car magazine Automobilwoche. A flying vehicle would certainly save a busy executive like him precious time.
"That would really make sense. If I drive from Zuffenhausen [location of [Porsche's HQ] to Stuttgart airport, I need at least half an hour, if I'm lucky. Flying would take only three and a half minutes," he said, as reported by Reuters.
The planned vehicle would be mostly autonomous but passengers would have some limited control over the vehicle's handling, according to Automobilwoche.
While any flying vehicle is years away, Porsche's entry into the market is bound to raise interest. Perhaps we can expect some sporty designs rather than the rather functional mini-helicopters revealed so far.
Whatever the design that emerges, Porsche is already behind the competition in this particular race. Other firms have developed working flying prototypes.
Last month, Airbus released a video of the first successful flight of its electric vertical take-off and landing passenger carrying autonomous drone called Vahana.
"Our goal is to democratise personal flight by leveraging the latest technologies such as electric propulsion, energy storage and machine vision," said Zach Lovering, Airbus Vahana project executive.
Meanwhile Uber is developing a flying taxi. Last November the Silicon Valley firm signed a deal with Nasa to develop a 200mph electric aircraft for testing in Los Angeles in 2020, the aim being to have a working flying taxi service in time for the 2028 Olympic Games in the city.
Uber has said it wants to run a fleet of "electronic jet-powered vehicles" that combine the functionalities of helicopters, drones and airplanes. They'll be able to take off and land vertically thanks to several small rotors.