It’s been a tough year for air taxi startups. The UK’s Vertical Aerospace is running short of cash, while Germany’s Lillium faces bankruptcy. Targets for commercialisation keep getting extended. Investors are hesitant to commit. The reason for all the struggles is pretty simple. Building, certifying, and commercialising brand-new aircraft designs like electric vertical take-off and landing aircraft (eVTOLs) is complex, notoriously expensive, and depends on lengthy regulatory processes.  That’s partly why German startup Vaeridion is pursuing a simpler, potentially cheaper, route to electric flight using an aircraft it calls the “microliner”.  “The microliner looks like a regular plane and it…

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