Australia urgently needs an air taxi research and development sandbox
Speaking at Global Drone 2026 at Cbus Super Stadium today, Skyportz CEO Clem Newton-Brown OAM called on Australian governments to establish an industry-wide research and development hub to support the introduction of electric vertical take-off and landing aircraft (eVTOLs).
Several Australian states have released policy documents supporting the advanced air mobility (AAM) sector, and the Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA) has published vertiport design guidance. Despite this, no purpose-built vertiport has yet been built in Australia. Meanwhile, the passenger eVTOL industry is concentrating its efforts in the United States, the Middle East and Asia, where the sector is known as the “Low-Altitude Economy”.
How other markets are moving ahead
Leading markets have set up dedicated “sandboxes”: programs where governments let industry test aircraft and infrastructure in real conditions under regulator supervision.
- Hong Kong: the Hong Kong Government’s Low-altitude Economy Regulatory Sandbox selected 38 pilot projects in its first batch. Its successor, Sandbox X, launched in November 2025 and drew more than 100 applications, with 38 projects selected so far. Sandbox X includes a dedicated stream for eVTOLs and other unconventional aircraft designed to carry passengers.
- United States: in March 2026 the US Department of Transportation and the Federal Aviation Administration selected eight projects, spanning 26 states, for the eVTOL Integration Pilot Program (eIPP), to trial advanced air mobility operations in real airspace.
- Florida: Florida has emerged as a leader. Its statewide project was one of the eight eIPP selections, and in April 2026 Governor Ron DeSantis signed legislation (HB1093) allowing the Florida Department of Transportation to fund up to 100per cent of vertiport projects not supported by federal funding.
“Our business has developed a vertipad patent called Aeroberm with the support of the Australian Government and Swinburne University of Technology. It is an Australian invention that we aim to make a global safety standard for new urban vertiports, yet there is nowhere in Australia where we can test it with the aircraft it has been designed to support,” said Clem Newton-Brown, CEO of Skyportz, the developer of the Aeroberm technology.
The Aeroberm product will be launched at the Avalon Australian International Airshow in February 2027. Skyportz has registered interest and letters of intent from partners in the United States, India, China and the Middle East.
“There is an incredible opportunity for the first state to seriously commit to attracting this industry to Australia, but it needs to move beyond press releases and policy positions to actually build the vertiport infrastructure,” said Mr Newton-Brown.
Leanne St George, Chief Executive of Global Drone, said: “Global Drone has brought together the whole industry on the Gold Coast this week. We need to keep the momentum going and establish practical facilities where new and emerging technologies can be tested and refined.”
Global Drone 2026 runs from 11 to 13 November at Cbus Super Stadium, Gold Coast.
Background: Swinburne’s fractal panel research
The Aeroberm technology was developed using computational fluid dynamics (CFD) research by Swinburne University of Technology, presented at Vertical Flight Society Forum 82 in Florida in May 2026. That work indicated the fractal surface dissipates rotor downwash and outwash energy considerably faster than flat or grated surfaces. Because rotor noise is closely linked to airflow near the ground, early follow-up modelling by Munich Aeroacoustics suggests the Aeroberm vertipad could also reduce noise impacts around the landing site.
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