Ascendance Flight Technologies has closed a 10 million Euro funding round backed by Habert Dassault Finance, Celeste Management, M Capital, Kima Ventures and IRDI. The round also includes some senior leaders from the industry and international entrepreneurs.

Ascendance is a Toulouse, France-based company developing the Atea, a VTOL aircraft powered by Sterna, its proprietary hybrid-electric technology stack. It provides the technologies that can empower aircraft manufacturers to reduce the environmental impact of future aircraft generations. Thanks to the experience of its former Airbus E-Fan programme team who achieved the first electric flight over the Channel, Ascendance aims to be a leader in designing a new era of sustainable aviation.

Putting the company on the right financial track to certification and commercialisation, Ascendance has attracted top tier financial investors. This successful funding round follows the announcement of the high-profile board: former Safran chairman Jean-Paul Herteman, former executive committee member at Renault Jean-Christophe Kugler and former head of the Airbus E-Aircraft programme Agnès Plagneux-Bertrand.

With the injection of funds, the company plans to expand its product development capabilities, notably through demonstrators. According to Jean-Christophe Lambert, co-founder and CEO: “This successful round of funding will allow us to focus on full scale prototypes and patents in order to accelerate the development and industrialisation of our technologies and products. We will also continue to recruit the best talent to shape a team that will impact tomorrow's clean aviation. So far, we are on schedule in the development of our disruptive hybrid-electric technologies. Recent technological achievements, our endorsement by renowned industrial figures such as our board members and Robert Lafontan, the signing of a longtime partnership with Capgemini Engineering and successful testing campaigns confirm that the company is on the right track.”

The start-up, created in 2018, was founded by four former team members of the E-Fan programme, who thanks to this initial experience in all-battery electric aviation were able to acknowledge first-hand the limitations of full-battery systems for commercial operations. Confronted with the lack of sustainable solutions in aeronautics, they were convinced electric-hybrid propulsion to be the appropriate response. Their vision became the Atea, a VTOL, and Sterna, its proprietary hybrid technology stack. The first public flights of the aircraft are scheduled for 2024, using the occasion of the Paris Olympics.