JetZero announced Monday that it has secured up to $100 million in new financing to advance construction of its full-scale Jet1 demonstrator and related manufacturing work. Jet1 is being built by Scaled Composites in Mojave, California, and will serve as the piloted test aircraft for JetZero’s unconventional all-wing configuration.
Jet1 Toward Flight
Ahead of the full-scale demonstrator, JetZero’s Pathfinder flight-test program has flown five generations of scaled aircraft across more than 30 flights. The company says the program has been used to develop and validate the configuration and flight-control laws intended for Jet1.
Jet1 will support development of the Z4, an aircraft JetZero says will carry about 250 passengers up to 5,000 nautical miles. The company broke ground in June on an 8-million-square-foot manufacturing campus in Greensboro, North Carolina, where it plans to produce the Z4.
JetZero claims the all-wing configuration could reduce fuel consumption by as much as 50% compared with conventional tube-and-wing aircraft of similar capacity.
Funding The Program
The new financing is structured as a borrowing agreement, or “facility,” that gives JetZero access to as much as $100 million from Pinegrove Credit Partners and Silicon Valley Bank. Funds from the facility arrangmenet will support Jet1 construction and technology development as well as tooling and production infrastructure at its Greensboro manufacturing campus.
“This facility is targeted for pace,” JetZero CEO and co-founder Tom O’Leary said in Monday’s announcement. “Through this facility, we will fund tooling and production facilities in North Carolina, advancing aerospace innovation and reindustrializing America. Not only has the time come to reshape aviation, but the Z4 will lead the way.”
JetZero is targeting a first flight of Jet1 in the fourth quarter of 2027 and commercial service for the Z4 in the early 2030s.
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