Heart Aerospace’s Electric Aircraft: From a Printed Model to First Flight

YC’s Gustaf Alströmer visits Heart Aerospace and speaks with co-founder and CEO Anders Forslund about electric regional aircraft. The video follows the X1 demonstrator and the company’s plans for a future passenger aircraft.

Forslund recalls showing YC a small 3D-printed aircraft model in 2019. Seven years later the team has built a full-scale demonstrator, a path from concept to hardware that required many intermediate steps.

Heart describes its mission as reducing the cost of regional air travel through hybrid-electric aircraft. Forslund contrasts the mechanical simplicity of electric motors with the complexity of aircraft engines.

Electric propulsion can be controlled for different phases of flight, including taxiing. The team shows battery packs inside the fuselage and explains why energy use on the ground matters on a short route.

Forslund argues that conventional jet engines are optimized for longer flights and that taxiing and other fixed phases consume a larger share of fuel on short trips. The economics depend on the aircraft, route, energy prices and utilization.

The company sees potential to reconnect regional airports if operating costs can be reduced. Forslund cites modeled cost improvements under particular fuel-price assumptions; these are projections, not demonstrated airline results.

Forslund describes growing up near a Swedish air force base and becoming interested in aircraft. Later, conversations about electric aviation and work with drones led him to pursue the idea.

At YC the early team sought interest from airlines, using the small printed model to make its concept tangible. He says initial airline conversations helped the company move toward a larger aircraft program.

One important airline contact came through a message found in a spam folder. The anecdote illustrates how early customer development can involve unexpected channels and persistent follow-up.

The design is deliberately conventional rather than futuristic. The team wants a practical regional aircraft, with structures and systems suited to airline operation and certification.

The factory tour shows components made in-house. Forslund says controlling selected parts can shorten iteration compared with waiting for a long supplier process, although a company must also manage the complexity of manufacturing them.

Testing includes deliberately introducing faults, such as programming errors or disconnected wires, to evaluate how systems respond. Redundancy and failure handling are central to an aircraft design.

The planned cabin is designed around regional passengers, while the team evaluates battery cells from different suppliers. Battery performance, weight and safety influence the aircraft’s useful range.

Reserve energy is a key constraint: aircraft must be able to handle diversions and other contingencies. Forslund explains the proposed hybrid system as a way to carry reserve energy without relying on batteries alone.

The discussion turns to system safety and the risks of software and control logic. The team describes testing failures and designing systems to tolerate them; a prototype flight does not by itself establish commercial certification.

Forslund says Heart is targeting regional fixed-wing aviation rather than starting with flying taxis. Existing airports and an established passenger market shape that choice.

He expects future improvements in batteries and autonomy to change the economics over time. These are forward-looking possibilities and depend on technical development, regulation and deployment.

The video returns to X1’s first flight. Heart reports that the battery-electric demonstrator flew for 27 minutes on August 12, 2026, under an experimental certificate; the flight tested a demonstrator rather than a certified passenger service.

The video describes the planned ES-30 as a 30-seat hybrid-electric successor, with targets for range and charging. Those specifications and timelines are development goals, and Heart subsequently announced a 36-seat ES-36 program.

Forslund reflects on the long route from a small model to flight. His closing point is that founders should care deeply about the problem they are trying to solve, not simply the status of being a founder.