In a major milestone for India’s eVTOL and air taxi journey, Bengaluru-based Sarla Aviation has begun the ground testing of its electric vertical take-off and landing (eVTOL) demonstrator aircraft, SYLLA SYL-X1, at its test facility in Bengaluru.

The demonstrator has a 7.5-metre wingspan and is a half-scale version of the company’s planned full-scale aircraft. Sarla Aviation said SYL-X1 is currently the largest and most advanced privately developed eVTOL demonstrator in India.

The company said the aircraft was developed in around nine months, using significantly less capital than similar international programmes. According to Sarla Aviation, this milestone highlights the company’s engineering capability, execution speed and system maturity, marking a first for a private aerospace start-up in the country.

SYL-X1 is a functional sub-scale aircraft built to test structural behaviour, propulsion integration and system-level safety architecture. The company said the demonstrator is designed at a meaningful scale, going beyond academic or small remote-controlled prototypes.

Importantly, the aircraft has been developed with future certification in mind from the early design stage. It is intended to serve as a stepping stone toward Sarla Aviation’s planned full-scale eVTOL aircraft with a 15-metre wingspan.

Founded in October 2023 by Adrian Schmidt, Rakesh Gaonkar and Shivam Chauhan, Sarla Aviation is backed by venture capital firm Accel and angel investors, including Flipkart co-founder Binny Bansal and Zerodha co-founder Nikhil Kamath. In August this year, the company appointed former civil aviation secretary Rajiv Bansal as an advisor.

Rakesh Gaonkar, Co-founder and Chief Technology Officer, said the company’s focus is on building a long-term aviation platform rather than rushing to be first. “We are building a platform that can be certified, produced and safely operated, designed and owned entirely in India. Our goal is to bring this new era of aviation technology home,” he said.

The company said its challenge goes beyond aircraft design to building a certification-aligned flight-testing ecosystem and working through India’s still-evolving aerospace supply chain. Sarla Aviation added that its technology roadmap aims to deliver helicopter-class mission endurance, while reducing costs, operational complexity and safety risks through electric propulsion and integrated system design.