I'd challenge anyone to guess, but one of these is the original and the other me-too configurations of LIFT + CRUISE ~ to the best of my knowledge.
Earliest to the table and resident of fondly-remembered Mountain View in California is Wisk. This venture is a collab between Boeing ~ who know an aircraft when they see it ~ and one of the Google twins whose attention was drawn many years ago to the prospects of eVTOL machines.
They set a trend that every other air taxi project has followed since, in that it began life as an array of lift-motors that was soon superseded by prototypes with a pair of wings and lift-motors that could be vectored so as to provide forward thrust. Those connected with conventional aviation knew that pure lift from anything less than the sizeable dimensions of a helicopter rotor was both expensive and inefficient, though like teenagers the newer entrants to the field had to learn the hard way.
There was considerable argy-bargy when Archer (at left) appeared to have copied the design, not least because many of its employees had been poached from the prior effort. Again there is nothing new under the sun, as Fokker did the same to the UK manufacturer Handley Page when they turned the Herald into the decidedly successful Friendship.
They have however kissed and made up, which leaves the only UK entrant standing in the form of Vertical Aerospace (centre), a recipient of the bulk of taxpayer funds in this field despite its founder having coined it in our broken energy market... and you thought the Russians invented oligarchs?
Ed. what the author is trying to say is that he wishes the project every success, and is fully prepared to eat humble pie on livestream as and when you meet in court.
