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Joby Aviation public merger

Joby Aviation raises $1.6 billion in SPAC merger to certify, manufacture electric VTOL aircraft

By Brian Garrett-Glaser | February 24, 2021

Estimated reading time 3 minutes, 6 seconds.

Joby Aviation will merge with special purpose acquisition company Reinvent Technology Partners (RTP) in a deal that provides the Santa Cruz, California-based electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) aircraft developer with approximately $1.6 billion in cash, resulting in a post-money valuation of $6.6 billion.

Joby Aviation, widely considered the leader in eVTOL technology, will go public via merger with blank-check firm Reinvent Technology Partners at a valuation of $6.6 billion. Joby Aviation Photo

The transaction, expected to close in Q2 of 2021, will see Joby Aviation listed on the New York Stock Exchange as the company continues working toward its long-term vision of saving a billion people an hour a day via quiet, affordable electric vertical flight. Contributors to the $835 million private investment in public equity (PIPE) include Uber Technologies, The Baupost Group, funds and accounts managed by BlackRock, Fidelity Management & Research LLC, and Baillie Gifford.

Long considered the leader in eVTOL aircraft development, Joby Aviation has flown its full-scale production prototype more than 700 times and is the first and only known eVTOL company to have received airworthiness approval from the U.S. Air Force and agreed upon a certification basis for its aircraft with the Federal Aviation Administration. The G-1 certification basis is expected to be published in the Federal Register in the next few months.

Reid Hoffman, co-founder of LinkedIn and co-director of RTP, will join Joby Aviation’s board of directors once the transaction closes. Hoffman is known to be a vocal proponent of safe autonomous mobility; in 2018, through venture capital firm Greylock Partners, he invested in Pittsburgh-based Aurora Technologies, which later absorbed Uber’s Advanced Technologies Group.

The full story is available on eVTOL.com.

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