Touring Club Switzerland’s Mobility Academy and FIA launch the “Drone & Vertical Mobility Academy”

  • gb
31.03.22

The Mobility Academy of the Touring Club Switzerland (TCS), in collaboration with the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA), is launching the "Drone & Vertical Mobility Academy" based in Bern. The aim of this newly founded centre of excellence is to advise and support the FIA's 244 Member Organisations, who represent more than 80 million road users worldwide, as they enter the third dimension. The TCS Mobility Academy is thereby assuming an international pioneering role in urban air mobility.

drone academy, TCS, sustainable mobility

Similar to how road transport has changed in recent years in the face of technical innovations and cultural developments, the aviation sector is facing major transformations. Building on TCS’s many years of experience in air rescue, initial successes in drone pilot training, and the transport of medical goods using drones, the FIA Mobility Clubs are now looking to evaluate and establish new fields of application for drones and air-taxis in urban air mobility.

As a first step, the “Drone & Vertical Mobility Academy” (DAVMA), which is supported by the FIA Innovation Fund, intends to examine pioneering projects from Africa, America, Asia and Europe over the next three years, and develop them further to facilitate FIA Mobility Clubs' entry into the vertical mobility ecosystem.

The focus will not only be on drone innovations for transporting goods in the healthcare sector, training drone pilots, promoting social acceptance and sustainability, but also on integrating air-taxis into future multimodal transport systems. "Automobility is no longer just about cars on roads. With the "Drone & Vertical Mobility Academy", we provide FIA Mobility Clubs with everything from knowledge to working business models to make them pioneers of a new electric, autonomous, vertical mobility world" emphasises Nicolas Brieger, Head of the “Drone & Vertical Mobility Academy”.

The TCS Mobility Academy has been exploring the future of mobility since 2008 and is one of the drivers of electric and shared multimodal mobility in Switzerland. Among other things, it manages the business of two transport associations, “Swiss eMobility” and the “Swiss Alliance for Collaborative Mobility”, and is also the founder and operator of the world’s first and still largest sharing-platform for electric cargo bikes “carvelo2go”. "With the new “Drone & Vertical Mobility Academy”, the TCS Mobility Academy is taking an extremely important place in future-oriented vertical mobility — and on the international stage. This fills me with pride and joy, but it is no coincidence as the TCS Mobility Academy, which is a think tank for mobility issues of the future, already enjoys a great reputation far beyond the country's borders," says TCS General Director Jürg Wittwer.

The advancement brought by the launch of the “Drone & Vertical Mobility Academy” was acknowledged by the FIA. “One of the fundamental perspectives of the FIA is to be responsive to change through innovation. Today the FIA is delighted to announce its collaboration with the Mobility Academy of the TCS to support the development of vertical and sustainable mobility. With this new initiative, the FIA would like to inspire its Automobile Club Members and help them address the challenges of tomorrow’s mobility” says FIA Deputy President for Automobile Mobility and Tourism Tim Shearman.