Natilus challenges the Boeing-Airbus duopoly

Natilus (San Diego, Calif., U.S.) was co-founded by Aleksey Matyushev and Anatoly Star in 2016 to develop blended wing body (BWB) aircraft to meet the growing demand from airlines for more efficient cargo and passenger platforms. The Kona — an 85-foot wingspan, 19,000-pound platform to be certified per General Aviation guidelines — is targeted for first flight in 2026 and entry into service (EIS) in 2028. It has amassed 460 pre-orders. Now, Natilus (pronounced NAW-tuh-luhs) has announced the Horizon, a  200-passenger aircraft for the narrowbody market with an EIS in the early 2030s. Both aircraft offer significant advantages over traditional tube-and-wing models currently serving the market. For more details, see “Natilus announces Horizon blended wing body aircraft for the 200-passenger narrowbody market.”

Backstory and vision

Matyushev holds an aerospace engineering degree from Embry Riddle Aeronautical University and has more than 20 years of experience in aviation/aerodynamics, including as the aerodynamics lead on unmanned aircraft systems for Kratos Defense. “My co-founder, Anatoly, is more from rapid prototyping,” he notes. “Early on, we both worked at Piper Aircraft, which is purely sheet metal fabrication.” That experience would come into play later with Natilus. “But after Piper, I was recruited to work on rapid prototyping for defense programs, where composites were key, because you can build large pieces quickly.

“After the military programs, I got tired of sleeping under my desk, so I left and started an industrial design studio with Anatoly,” he continues. “We initially focused on consumer electronic products, and moved quickly through three different customer programs, successfully delivering on time and on schedule. We did everything from chargers to amplifiers, and then later got into consumer goods like glassware and textiles. The company had grown to be a pretty successful business, but the bulk of our manufacturing was in Asia. And we were always struggling with how to bring goods to the U.S. for consumer retail shelves in a way that was reliable and fast, yet affordable.”

The fundamental problem was in the traditional tube-and-wing design of the cargo aircraft, he explains. They were filling the volume before they maxed out on weight. “The industry was looking for a more efficient design,” says Matyushev. “Our thinking was to lean into our aviation and aerospace backgrounds and tackle this problem. That was the genesis of Natilus — to develop a volume-centric design for air freight based on the BWB. The goal was to essentially normalize the BWB on this air cargo platform — i.e., solve all the technical challenges and get our foundation in design and manufacturing — and then eventually move into the passenger sector. But we weren’t in a rush, and so we didn't know when that jump to the second aircraft was going to happen.”

Why develop Horizon now?

But of course, Natilus has now announced its launch of the Horizon aircraft. “So, we will have two products,” says Matyushev. “The first one is the Kona regional freighter, which we're manufacturing in our facility here in San Diego. That's an 80% composite and 20% metal airplane that’s about 24 months away from first flight. And then the Horizon is the next step, which is our first entry into the passenger market. And that will be a 100% carbon fiber composite [CFRP] airplane.

“We’ve had a really interesting year due to the challenges facing Boeing and Airbus,” he continues. “And a lot of the airlines have started to question if this duopoly is really the best thing for the market. We’ve been approached by a couple of major airlines that have basically asked if we can adapt our BWB cargo aircraft into a passenger version. And we suddenly realized that this is the right time to move ahead.

“There’s a pent-up demand for roughly 40,000 airplanes over the next 20 years,” notes Matyushev, “and narrowbodies will make up 70-80% of that. Even with Boeing and Airbus production targets, there are still 15,000 airplanes that are unspoken for.” Note, this is based on the forecast that Airbus and Boeing will build 15,000 and 10,000 narrowbody aircraft, respectively, over the next 20 years. However, currently, neither aircraft is meeting their own projections and commitments, while both have pushed out planned ramp-ups at least 1-2 years.

“Their customers appear to be ready for something different,” says Matyushev, “which is also driven by the airlines’ own ESG [environmental, social, governance] targets. We have a technology that can meet those targets. Because all these factors are coming together, I think the market is now ready to bear a third aircraft OEM for the narrowbody segment, and our investors have supported us to move forward on the Horizon passenger variant.”

Kona vs. Horizon construction

While the Kona is 80% CFRP/20% metallic, the Horizon will be an all-CFRP airframe. “There are certain manufacturing techniques that each material enables,” says Matyushev. “When we started with Kona, we took advantage of our experience with Piper and built the twin tails out of sheet metal in-house, without waiting for tooling. We did the same with the control surfaces, which are also pretty simple aluminum parts that you can do without much tooling. So, that gave us an advantage in getting started quickly. But as we looked toward the wings and fuselage, we invested in tools and made those as CFRP structures.”

Horizon will be a much larger aircraft — a wingspan of 118 versus 85 feet and maximum payload of 28 versus 3.8 metric tons. “If you look at the first commercial aircraft where the fuselage, wing and tail are all composite — such as the Airbus A350 —  they have a ratio of empty weight to maximum gross weight that is way lower than anything else on the market. It’s about a 10% reduction compared to an all-metal airplane. So, there are gains to using a CFRP airframe that have been proven.”

But there will also be significant challenges. “I think the biggest challenge is the size of the parts,” says Matyushev. “For example, the aluminum 737 fuselage, because it was a tube and wing design, fit on a train from St. Louis to Seattle. However, the substructures for a BWB are not traditional. So, we’re looking how we break up the fuselage into sub-modules and how much we need to vertically integrate due to transportation constraints for large structures such as the height of bridges or the length of train cars, for example.”

Natilus is also considering how to develop the necessary supply chains, he explains. “In this initial phase, we’re still relying on a couple of key suppliers, but the writing seems to be on the wall that CFRP production in-house is going to be very important. And it’s not only the transportation side of things, but it’s also autoclaves as well. Putting composite tube sections into tubular autoclaves makes sense, but the moment you have these oblong rectangles that are different in three dimensions, using an autoclave will be a challenge.  Yet that’s what most of the supply chain uses today. So, bringing manufacturing in-house, and looking at different ways of building the structures are core areas as we move forward with this scaled-up aircraft.”

This scaling is the big challenge, he admits. “We’re starting to think about the facilities and workforce, for example. We need a 3-million-square foot facility and 10,000 employees who are highly trained in CFRP production. I think those are the harder problems. There are facilities coming online that are very interesting, but the question is whether they are a good fit for a BWB with the manufacturing processes that we’re thinking about.”

Customers’ and pilots’ view of commercial BWB

One of Natilus’ inaugural customers is Ameriflight. “It is the largest feeder operator here in the U.S.,” says Matyushev, “with a fleet of 80-100 airplanes that they operate for customers such as UPS, FedEx and others. Kona is the perfect platform for them, because they have an aging fleet and are starting to really think about new and cutting-edge technology. They’ve placed an order for 20 of our airplanes. We also have a lot of other customers which are still undisclosed.”

But what does Kona achieve for Ameriflight? “We have competitors like the Cessna SkyCourier, which is a turboprop aircraft with exactly the same size and weight,” explains Matyushev. “But because Kona has so much more cubic volume, it can carry almost double the amount of revenue cargo for the same trip. So, when you think about that 2X increase in volume coupled with a 30% reduction in drag from the BWB aerodynamics and lift, you get nearly a 3X reduction in cost for the same payload category.

“For the Horizon, we’re just extending those advantages into the 200-passenger narrowbody market,” he continues. “Again, using our experience in aerodynamics, we can use a modified BWB design to achieve an aircraft that is 25% lighter, provides 40% greater capacity and has 50% less carbon emissions than aircraft used in commercial aviation today.”

Even with such advantages, the reality is that BWB are a totally different type of airframe, more akin to the B2 bomber than the current narrowbodies flying today. “There is a fundamental difference between the way that previous BWB aircraft like the B2 bomber are flown and how our airplanes fly,” notes Matyushev. “The B2 has really complex flight control systems because the airplane is inherently unstable. It has quadruple redundant systems that essentially take the aerodynamics and present them in a way that the pilot can feel like it’s a normal airplane.”

“In contrast, our airplanes are designed to be aeronautically stable and fly the same as a traditional airliner. They look different, but they fly the same. A lot of our airline customers bring their chief pilots to fly our simulators. They comment that if I didn’t show them they’re flying a BWB, they would think they’re flying something like a 737, or an A320, just on a general aviation scale because those simulators are for the Kona.”

Why would an autonomous aircraft need a simulator? “While we intend for Kona to be autonomous capable,” notes Matyushev, “the first aircraft will have a cockpit and can be optionally piloted. So, we need to ensure that pilots can safely operate the aircraft and simulation is an important and necessary step as we advance through design and certification.”

“I think that’s one of our achievements as a company — we’ve been able to create the flight handling that pilots and the FAA want, but in a different form package that can achieve the needed performance without the complex fly-by-wire systems,” he adds.

Certification basis and timeline

A full-scale Kona prototype has been constructed and will begin flight testing in 2025 with first certification flights starting in 2026 and commercial service in 2028. This is a normal timeline for current tube-and-wing aircraft, but Kona is a BWB airframe which has not yet been certified as a commercial aircraft.

“Yes, but we’re not qualifying any materials,” says Matyushev. “That was an important pillar in our approach to these aircraft, at least to start. We’re using quite a bit of the work that's already been done on the Toray and Syensqo [carbon fiber/epoxy] prepregs for the aviation industry by NIAR. So, we’re using the NCAMP allowables and known manufacturing processes to accelerate our time to market.”

He also explains that the Kona certification is under general aviation guidelines — which applies to aircraft 19,000 pounds or less — and is typically an 18-month process, but the Horizon will be a Part 25 transport category certification. “And, of course, that will be a longer certification process,” he concedes. “Still, depending on how you structure it, that’s a 2- to 3-year program if executed correctly. That’s what Boeing used to be able to do and the Airbus A350 was actually completed in less than 2 years. So, there are precedents within the industry for the amount of time and expense required.”

This is true, but the Boeing 787 took 8 years, and part of that was the novel airframe construction it chose of joining complete composite barrels versus the A350 approach of using composite fuselage panels, which was very similar to the previous metal fuselage construction/assembly method. Matyushev acknowledges this: “The question is how much new technology you inject because that will essentially create more of a barrier for entry into the market. So, we’re trying to keep things as simple as possible with known materials, manufacturing, engines and systems.”

With all of this in mind, when will Natilus finalize the design for Horizon? “We’re trying to freeze that design as quickly as possible,” he says. “I mean, the entry into service is the early 2030s, which is 6-7 years away, but from our perspective, that’s not a lot of time. So, we already have wind tunnel testing scheduled for next year, and we hope to move toward finalizing the aerodynamic design toward the end of that, but then we have to start working on the internals, systems and manufacturing. So, we have to start moving quickly now.”

Normalization of BWB, future materials

Matyushev believes that BWB aircraft have become normalized. “What we’ve seen over the last 10-15 years is that there’s an opening in technology, if you do it correctly, so that you can bring one to market,” he explains. “The question is going to be execution and where you push the risk. From our perspective, we’re trying to essentially take existing pieces but put them together in a unique way that will still offer the opportunities and efficiencies that our customers want in the near-term.”

So, Natilus is pushing to get to first flight for Kona. “We then need to apply the lessons learned from that to the Horizon so that we can tackle this issue of how to produce one airplane a day, which is really what the market needs over the next 20 years,” says Matyushev.

With that in mind, wouldn’t it make sense to look at thermoplastic composites (TPC), which enable parts to be stamped in minutes and which both Boeing and Airbus are already using? “I really like the idea of thermoplastics because the tooling is so much simpler. It essentially is taking a note from the sheet metal side of things — just using a stamp tool to create a rib, for example — but with materials that are higher performing and lighter weight. But the delta is in the qualification.”

Here, he refers to the current status of TPC in the industry. TPC clips and cleats are used throughout the B787 and A350 airframes and welded TPC wing leading edges and rudders have been flying for decades on Airbus, Dassault and Gulfstream passenger aircraft. Still, adding this technology into the Kona and/or Horizon would most likely increase the complexity of certification and lengthen the process. “I really like the idea of Airbus continuing to move forward, where we can then certify by equivalency based on materials, processes and structures they put into production.”

For now, says Matyushev, “we’re excited because we’re at the right place at the right time. The market needs new solutions and we have a very achievable timeline to provide those. At the same time, it's challenging to think about the manufacturing, facilities and workforce required, but we’re having great conversations with potential sites, our customers and investors are providing the support we need, and we’re developing new partners and building a supply chain.”