India Will Become Major Air Taxi Market, Says Skyportz

Hyderabad: Australia-based vertipad developer Skyportz has projected India as one of the world’s largest future air taxi markets, with an estimated 200 to 250 million passenger trips a year by 2045. Delhi alone is expected to account for around 40 million trips.“The India story is compelling because the need is clear. Congestion is persistent, travel times are long, and people value reliable time savings,” said Clem Newton-Brown, chief executive officer of Skyportz, after releasing a market study released at the Wings India 2026 on Thursday. The Advanced Air Mobility vertipad market study places Delhi as a high-potential launch city and it cited long commute distances, slow peak-hour travel speeds and heavy dependence on road transport. The report projects annual passenger revenues of about $400 million in Delhi by 2045, with an indicative extrapolation of $2.5 billion across India over the same period. Skyportz’s modelling estimates demand for about 10,000 to 15,000 vertipads across the country by 2045, anchored by a requirement of around 2,200 pads in Delhi. The study notes that rising household wealth and comparatively lower operating costs could widen access to air taxi services over time, while supporting dense urban commuter networks alongside intercity and regional routes. As air taxi costs fall, the report says services within cities and between nearby cities become more competitive which will lead to demand for facilities spread across metropolitan areas rather than concentrated at a few locations. Around 80 per cent of vertipad installations in the Delhi system are expected to support urban commuter services, with the remainder catering to intercity and regional travel. The company said its Aeroberm modular vertipad system is designed for network-scale rollout in high-density cities such as Delhi that allows rapid installation at ground level and on rooftops, along with phased expansion from a few dozen pads to several thousand as aircraft fleets grow. “Delhi’s numbers make one thing clear: this is not a small boutique market,” Newton-Brown said. Skyportz also announced a local partner memorandum of understanding with Gomsons Aviation to support the product rollout in India. Gomsons director Ravi Musuku said he was pleased to partner with Skyportz and work towards building the air taxi sector in India alongside a leading vertipad manufacturer. Newton-Brown is in India for the airshow and has meetings scheduled with the Directorate General of Civil Aviation and domestic air taxi developers including ePlane, Sarla, Nalwa and BluJ Aero.



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