By Julie Johnsson | Bloomberg
Startup JetZero in Long Beach has raised $175 million from investors to take on the planemaking duopoly of Airbus SE and Boeing Co. with a mid-sized aircraft shaped like a giant manta ray.
The Series B financing, led by venture investor B Capital, takes the total amount raised to more than $1 billion including government grants, incentives and commercial commitments, JetZero said. It will help fund the first full-size prototype of the triangle-shaped jet, which promises a 50% improvement in fuel savings over conventional models like Boeing’s 767 aircraft.
The demonstrator aircraft, dubbed the Z4, remains on track to take its initial flight by late next year as the company moves to take advantage of growing airline interest in mid-range jets, JetZero Chief Executive Officer Tom O’Leary said in an interview.
JetZero, founded in 2020 with its headquarters at the Long Beach Airport, earlier landed $79.4 million in Series A funding and a $235 million award from the US Air Force. United Airlines Ventures, Northrop Grumman Corp., 3M Ventures and RTX Ventures all participated in the latest funding round.
The company’s design features a shorter fuselage that’s wide enough to generate lift while saving fuel, with two engines at the rear of the plane providing power and stability. The blended-wing-body concept was refined over several decades by co-founder Mark Page at McDonnell Douglas and Boeing, with around $1 billion in funding from NASA, according to the company.
JetZero is targeting the middle of the commercial jet market with a plane that would seat about 250 passengers and travel 5,000 nautical miles, sufficient range for trans-Atlantic journeys. And O’Leary’s set an ambitious goal: beginning commercial service by the early 2030s, years ahead of the next all-new designs by Airbus and Boeing.
“When has a start-up ever been able to launch standing on the shoulders of NASA research to the tune of $1 billion into a market where there is no competitive offering,” said O’Leary, a veteran of Tesla Inc. and air taxi startup Beta Technologies. “It’s a dream situation for a startup to have that market impact.”
Making good on those plans is a daunting task given the billions of dollars required to stand up manufacturing and a supply chain.
Aviation is littered with companies that have tried to take on Airbus and Boeing. Manufacturers in China and Russia have struggled to make inroads with competing jets and Bombardier Inc. was nearly bankrupted by the C-Series, a jet it handed over to Airbus for $1 in 2017.
JetZero already has a powerful backer in Northrop Grumman as it pursues military contracts for an aerial tanker, O’Leary said. Northrop’s Scaled Composites subsidiary is building the initial Z4 prototype in Mojave, California.
The upstart also has 200 purchase commitments — which aren’t as binding as orders — from the likes of United Airlines Holdings Inc. and Alaska Air Group Inc., which announced in 2024 that it was a Series A investor. More than 15 airlines are providing feedback as members of a focus group.
Aviation is ripe for innovation and a shake-up similar to commercial space, where the success of Elon Musk’s SpaceX has fostered an ecosystem of startups, said Jeff Johnson, a general partner with B Capital, which has $9 billion in assets under management and is a strategic partner of Boston Consulting Group.
After studying JetZero for several years, Johnson said he was convinced to invest by the company’s combination of next-generation technology and “customers that are truly excited about what they are bringing.”
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