Boeing is offloading three autonomous aviation-focused businesses—including its self-flying air taxi arm Wisk Aero—to Archer Aviation in an agreement that one executive described as a “win-win” for both companies.
Archer will acquire Wisk—as well as SkyGrid, an air traffic management provider, and Insitu, a developer of military uncrewed aircraft systems (UAS)—in an all-stock transaction that gives Boeing warrants to purchase up to $200 million of Archer stock in the future. The New York Times reported that Boeing will take a 16.5 percent stake in Archer, while The Wall Street Journal reported Boeing’s equity as nearly 20 percent.
The Air Current reported that either way, the deal would make Boeing Archer’s largest outside shareholder. According to the outlet, Boeing plans to invest $55 million in an upcoming Archer funding round. Per a Securities and Exchange Commission filing, Boeing will have a seat on Archer’s board so long as it retains at least 10 percent ownership of the company’s stock.
Notably, a technology sharing agreement would give Boeing continued access to Wisk’s core autonomous flight technology for its current and next-generation aircraft. Boeing took sole ownership of the air taxi manufacturer in 2023. Offloading Wisk to Archer will allow it to focus on its core commercial and defense units while leaving the door open for the integration of autonomy.
Unlike Archer and other competitors developing piloted eVTOL (electric vertical takeoff and landing) air taxis, Wisk has designed its Generation 6—the model it aims to certify for commercial operations—to fly autonomously at launch. It lacks a traditional cockpit and pilot controls, adding more space to accommodate up to four passengers.
Archer’s Midnight is a piloted eVTOL model, also designed to carry up to four passengers. The company is also developing two variants—Halo and Thunder—that are hybrid-electric and autonomous, as well as a proprietary artificial intelligence platform called Zee.
Both companies’ aircraft are intended for urban and suburban operations, with range capped at about 100 miles.
Archer and Boeing described the deals as “definitive agreements” but said they are subject to closing conditions. They aim to complete the transaction by the end of 2026.
‘Win-Win’
Brian Yutko, Boeing’s vice president for commercial airplanes product development and the former CEO of Wisk, called the agreement a “win-win” for both companies.
“It allows Wisk, SkyGrid, and Insitu to accelerate capability development and time to market while ensuring Boeing capitalizes on its investments in these technologies over the past two decades through continued development in our core businesses,” Yutko said in a statement.
Wisk was founded in 2010 as Zee Aero and in 2017 merged with Larry Page-backed Kitty Hawk before being rebranded as Cora, the name of one of the company’s early air taxi prototypes. In 2019, Kitty Hawk partnered with Boeing to further develop Cora and spun off the company under the Wisk Aero banner. Boeing in 2022 invested close to $500,000 in Wisk and in 2023 became the company’s sole owner.
Archer and Wisk have butt heads in the past. The latter sued the former in 2021 alleging theft of trade secrets, and Archer countersued for $1 billion in damages. The companies settled the dispute in 2023, with Boeing investing an undisclosed amount that would fund the integration of Wisk’s technology on future Archer aircraft. The agreement further made Wisk the exclusive provider of autonomy for Archer vehicles.
In announcing the deal, Archer and Boeing said that Wisk has conducted more than 1,700 test flights with six generations of eVTOL aircraft. Only a handful, though, are with the Generation 6, which began untethered flight testing in December.
The Gen 6 will use a combination of computers, predictive hardware and software, radar, sensors, and ground links to fly predefined routes. According to Wisk, it will be able to detect and avoid other aircraft on its own but be overseen by remote Multi-Vehicle Supervisors. Cindy Comer, the company’s vice president of SMS, certification, and quality, earlier this year told FLYING she refers to the company’s technology as “automated” rather than autonomy.
Wisk has been targeting certification toward the end of the decade, a timeline that puts it behind competitors developing crewed eVTOL models, such as Archer. It too has hurdles to overcome before achieving certification for its flagship Midnight. The most crucial is demonstrating a piloted transition from vertical to forward flight, the defining capability of an eVTOL. Joby Aviation and Beta Technologies have both done so with full-scale prototypes.
Archer is the official air taxi provider for the 2028 Olympic Games in Los Angeles, with plans to ferry spectators, athletes, and dignitaries between venues during the event. Before entering FAA type inspection authorization (TIA) and securing certification, Archer will need to show that Midnight is capable of transitioning with a pilot on board.
The addition of Insitu—which Archer and Boeing said generates about $200 million in annual revenue—could help the company fund its certification efforts.
‘AI Platform’
In an interview with The Air Current, Archer founder and CEO Adam Goldstein framed the acquisitions as a boon to its development of hybrid-electric, autonomous aircraft in partnership with Anduril.
Archer in a news release described the deal as creating an “end-to-end physical AI platform” for aircraft and air traffic management. It said Wisk, SkyGrid, and Insitu combined have nearly two million flight hours and will “bring a deep autonomy foundation” to its Zee AI.
Archer announced Zee in July and described it as an “aviation-specific foundational model” that pulls data from more than 6,000 ADS-B receivers, as well as air traffic control communications, maps, charts, aircraft state, and weather. It said the platform is designed for airline operations, airspace management, and “copilot assistance,” with a particular focus on preventing runway incursions and collisions on the ground.
The predictive model uses a “generative” framework to “model the full distribution of possible futures rather than a single rigid path,” Archer said. It is built to run on-device or offline, with no connectivity required.
“Today, Zee serves as decision support for pilots, controllers and airline operators,” Archer wrote in a blog post. “Tomorrow, we believe it can act as end-to-end autonomy across every layer of aviation.”
The company is using California’s Hawthorne Municipal Airport (KHHR), the lease for which it acquired last year, as a testing ground for Zee. Earlier this month, it said the platform predicted “real-time aircraft trajectories on the airport surface minutes into the future.”
In July, Archer said it was “in discussions” for pilot programs to deploy Zee with governments and airlines.