UAM MARKET PULSE

The FAA and Department of Transportation announced eight selections for the eVTOL Integration Pilot Program this week. This is the single most significant federal AAM infrastructure decision since the UAS Integration Pilot Program ended in 2020. The selections tell you where the federal government is placing its infrastructure bets for the next three years.

Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy framed it directly: this is the program that determines where next-generation aircraft actually fly in American airspace. Eight projects selected. Twenty-six states participating across the combined selections. The markets that landed eIPP projects just moved to the front of the federal infrastructure queue — and every other market now has a clearer picture of what the bar looks like.

For AirIndex, the eIPP selections are a direct scoring input. The Pilot Program factor (PLT, 15% weight) is the clearest binary signal in the model — either you have an FAA-sanctioned pilot program or you don’t. Markets with eIPP selections that weren’t already scoring on this factor will see upward score pressure as we verify each selection against our qualification criteria over the next two weeks.

Texas is the most consequential state in this round. TxDOT was selected for the program, which directly affects Dallas, Houston, and Austin — three of our tracked markets. Texas already leads in legislation (HB 1735 enacted). Adding federal pilot program participation to that legislative foundation makes the Texas markets the most structurally complete in the index.

Average across all 21 tracked U.S. metro markets: 40 · Full index at airindex.io

Arizona AAM legislation continues advancing. Arizona Capitol Times reported this week that advanced air mobility “could soon take flight” in the state. SB 1826 (AAM appropriation) and SB 1827 (Office of Advanced Air Mobility) remain in play. If enacted, Phoenix moves from 50 to Advanced territory. Arizona is the state-level story most likely to trigger a score change in Q2.

Joby’s Golden Gate flight got significant coverage this week. The San Francisco Bay crossing is a visibility milestone — not a certification milestone, but it signals to the market that Joby is positioning San Francisco as a launch market. Joby also secured the DOT eIPP selection, deepening the federal relationship. Cathie Wood’s ARK doubled down on JOBY stock. The operator signal for SF is strengthening.

Archer’s financial position is getting scrutiny. Analysts flagged “additional capital needs” this week. The company filed for resale of 5.33M shares and announced up to $8M in vendor stock issuance. Stock hit a new 52-week low. The Hopscotch Air partnership (regional air mobility via Part 135) suggests Archer is diversifying its commercialization path beyond pure urban eVTOL. For AirIndex, Archer’s market presence still scores — but the operator signal carries less weight when the operator’s financial runway is under question.

Pivotal is trialing ultralight eVTOL for emergency medical flights. This is a different vector — ultralight category, medical use case, existing helipad infrastructure. It sidesteps the certification timeline that Joby and Archer face. For AirIndex, this is relevant to the hospital helipad dimension of our Heliport Compliance Database — the 2,747 hospital sites we’ve flagged for eVTOL dimensional viability are exactly the infrastructure these operations would use.

This week we shipped the five-container intelligence architecture that backs every AirIndex score. The Factor Knowledge Base (FKB), Regulatory Precedent Library (RPL), Market Context Store (MCS), Operator Intelligence Database (OID), and Federal Programs Intelligence Store (FPIS) are now live in production. Scoring reads factor weights from the database at runtime. RPL auto-populates from the daily ingestion pipeline. Every score change is now traceable through the full evidence chain.

We also launched the Heliport Infrastructure Audit tool — state-level compliance screening across all 5,647 FAA-registered heliports. Five-question checklist, three compliance tiers, and a sample report for South Carolina is live now. Details and use cases at airindex.io/use-cases.

The eIPP selections are the lead story for the industry this week and the biggest federal AAM signal since the original IPP. We’re mapping each of the eight selections against our 21 tracked markets to determine which scores are affected. Expect score updates in Issue 5 once verification is complete. If you have visibility into which specific projects and markets were selected, we’d like to hear from you — the official announcement is light on geographic specifics.

AirIndex Intelligence — Market deep-dives, heliport compliance audits, gap analysis, and API access are available as negotiated intelligence packages. See our use cases or inquire at airindex.io/contact.

AirIndex is a UAM market intelligence platform scoring U.S. metro markets on their readiness for commercial eVTOL operations. Scores are updated automatically when qualifying regulatory, legislative, or operator events are detected. Built by Vertical Data Group, LLC.

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UAM Market Pulse · AirIndex by Vertical Data Group, LLC · airindex.io   |   Issue 4 · Week of April 3, 2026