The U.S. Air Force is ramping up its interest and investment in novel, blended-wing body (BWB) aircraft to address capability gaps in the Indo-Pacific.
The BWB is an offshoot of the tailless, all-wing aircraft concept, or flying wing, which dates back to the early days of aviation. The architecture merges the wing and fuselage, lying somewhere between the flying wing and conventional tube-and-wing. The configuration’s core advantages are fuel reduction, achieved through a high lift-to-drag ratio, and increased payload capacity.
Boeing and NASA were the first to study the concept in earnest during the 1990s and early 2000s. But few BWB designs have advanced beyond the prototype and demonstration phase.
BWB developer Natilus believes that could soon change.
The Air Force on Wednesday awarded the firm $3.5 million through the Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for Energy, Installations, and Environment (SAF/IE) and its Operational Energy-Innovation (OE-I) directorate. Nolan Giblin, Natilus’ chief operating officer, told FLYING the goal is to demonstrate a full-scale prototype aircraft by the end of the roughly 12-month contract.
Competitor JetZero is likewise developing a full-scale BWB prototype under a $235 million Air Force contract award, also aiming to fly it in 2027. JetZero’s larger Z4 promises a 50 percent reduction in fuel burn and is intended for the commercial passenger market, with investors including the venture arms of United Airlines and Alaska Airlines. The company also envisions a potential military airlift or tanker role for the Z4, with RTX Ventures, Northrop Grumman, and 3M also backing it.
But Natilus’ Kona—designed to reduce fuel burn by 30 percent and operational costs by 50 percent while more than doubling payload capacity versus comparable conventional aircraft—is intended specifically for regional cargo. The firm’s $3.5 million contract will mature the aircraft for operational defense demonstrations, covering research, development, test, and evaluation. It will earn the money over time by meeting agreed-upon milestones.
Giblin framed the agreement as “just the start” of Natilus’ formal engagement with the Air Force. He said the firm is exploring opportunities to “broaden the scope and increase the funding coming our way” under the existing contract as well as future agreements, possibly including a procurement deal.
Giblin said the company is “working hand in hand” with the Air Force toward that goal.
“It’s all well and good if you could build full-scale prototypes and fly and collect data and show the operational viability,” he said. “It means more if you can demonstrate a transition plan toward a procurement contract.”
Why BWB Could Be Attractive to the Air Force
Natilus has already begun developing a full-scale Kona prototype using venture and strategic capital. The regional BWB freighter is designed to serve both military and commercial use cases, with FedEx, UPS, and DHL feeder cargo airline Ameriflight among its potential customers.
Giblin said the military envisions Kona filling a gap between Joint Force Cessna 208 Caravan light utility aircraft and larger C-130 tactical aircraft. He said Kona will create a new class of “sub-tactical lift” aircraft sized for regional distribution and contested logistics.
“You have small tactical aircraft like the 208 that can move stuff over the last tactical mile, whereas a C-130 is really good at getting things into theater,” Giblin said. “But just given the payload capacity of the 208, sitting around 4,000 pounds, and the C-130, sitting around 40,000 pounds, there’s a huge gap there.”
Giblin said Natilus successfully pushed for language in the House Appropriations Committee’s report on the fiscal year 2027 NDAA, which explicitly suggests the Pentagon examine BWB designs to address that gap. The House passed its version of the legislation, but it has stalled in the Senate.
The Natilus COO said Kona’s 30 percent fuel burn reduction has been validated by subscale models through low-speed wind tunnel testing, and he is “pretty confident in the projection” for the scaled-up version. Combined with a 3.8-ton payload capacity and 800 nm range, with short-field capability, that efficiency could be a game-changer in the Indo-Pacific, where distances are long and fuel is constrained.
Giblin said there are “other theaters in which this platform would perform really well.” Regional airlift is the primary application, but Natilus believes Kona has a path to supporting communications relay, payload delivery, and intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance.
“In a fuel-constrained environment like the Pacific, efficiency translates directly into operational flexibility,” said Jim Hartle, associate deputy assistant secretary of the Air Force for operational energy, safety and occupational health, in a news release. “Kona provides an opportunity to evaluate how a commercially developed aircraft can contribute to distributed logistics while generating the data needed to inform future requirements.”
Autonomy could be another key advantage.
Commercial Kona models are initially intended for single-pilot operations. But the Air Force is interested in optionally piloted capability. Giblin said Natilus already has its own autonomy stack—informe by staff who previously worked for firms like Kratos, Northrop Grumman, and General Atomics—as well as “provisions on the hardware side of the house,” including actuation systems, to fulfill that vision. He said the company has examined autonomy for years, but the military’s involvement has “accelerated” its development.
Giblin added that Natilus has the “ability to partner with various industry folks that have already retrofitted 208s or C-130s with autonomy, so that we can lean more into the autonomy stack for the defense use of it.” He did not specify a partner. But firms such as Reliable Robotics and Merlin Labs have tested C-208s retrofitted with autonomy and been asked to study automating the larger C-130.
Ripple Effect
Many novel aviation technologies see their first action in the military before being commercialized. Kona and Natilus’ larger, passenger-carrying Horizon could follow that route.
The company is advancing Kona toward FAA Part 23 certification and full-scale flight testing, targeting Part 25 certification for Horizon. The FAA awarded Kona a Part 23 certification project number and is working to develop a formal G-1 certification basis, which Giblin said should arrive in the next few months.
“Over the last couple months, we’ve been meeting with [the FAA] frequently to walk through various systems on the platform, starting with propulsion and avionics and flight controls,” he said. “Hopefully soon we’ll have some news there.”
Bolstering the effort, the prototype Natilus is developing for the Air Force will be “aerodynamically conforming for FAA certification,” and it could later be used to validate the commercial use case. Ameriflight has a conditional agreement for 20 Kona aircraft that could replace airframes such as the Embraer EMB-120, Saab 340, and Beechcraft 1900C and Model 99 on feeder cargo routes.
“It’s the exact same airframe that has found a home in both markets,” Giblin said.
Under military evaluation, Natilus hopes to validate Kona’s integration with existing ground support equipment and operation in austere environments where infrastructure may be limited. He compared the military’s challenges in the Indo-Pacific to those of offshore oil and gas customers on the commercial side.
“They’re going to experience something very similar that the Air Force would in the Pacific,” Giblin said. “We don’t want to ask either market to reinvent how they interface with an aircraft on ground or through maintenance.”
In addition, though the commercial Kona freighter will be piloted at first, Natilus in the future plans to give it the same optionally piloted capability as the military variant. The firm’s planned demonstrations could help it understand how autonomy will translate from the Air Force to customers like Ameriflight.
Giblin believes the Air Force contract will help increase Natilus’ production rate and reduce acquisition costs over time, which “benefits both sides of the house.” That includes the firm’s development of Horizon.
Designed for up to 200 passengers, the design is larger than Kona, with a maximum takeoff weight “closer to that of the current narrowbody class of airplane,” while Kona’s 19,000-pound MTOW is akin to the Cessna 408 SkyCourier. Horizon is also faster (about 520 knots compared to 250 knots for Kona) and will fly at higher altitudes up to 35,000 feet.
But Giblin said that “everything we’re learning in the way of technology development, working with the FAA on a relationship-based process, scaling the production line, manufacturing site selection, all those things we’re doing for Kona today,” will help Natilus scale up to Horizon.
