Despite the rapid advancements in other technological sectors, commercial aircraft have remained fundamentally unchanged for decades. While electric vehicles are revolutionizing ground transportation, developments in aviation design and technology appear comparatively incremental.
The underlying reason lies in the complexities of designing and constructing new aircraft. Significant engineering challenges involving aerodynamics, thrust, and lift must be addressed. In addition, thousands of individual components require rigorous design, testing, and manufacturing. Furthermore, aviation is governed by strict regulatory frameworks, with agencies like the FAA supervising every stage from conceptualization through release and ongoing maintenance.
Nevertheless, the difficulty associated with innovation does not diminish its importance. While established manufacturers may find it challenging to shift toward entirely new aircraft models, this environment presents opportunities for agile startups.
Enter JetZero, an aviation startup that is developing an all-wing aircraft aimed at improving fuel efficiency by up to 50 percent by the 2030s.
Welcome to Siemens
So how does a startup tackle a project as complex as designing and manufacturing a completely new type of aircraft? With some help from Siemens, an industrial technology company focused on manufacturing, infrastructure, and transportation.
That help comes in the form of Siemens Xcelerator, an open digital business platform that can connect design, production, and maintenance through digital threads. It allows startups and small companies to access enterprise-grade tools that let them operate on the same level as massive incumbents.
It does so in part by utilizing cutting-edge AI at every step of the process. “It’s almost easier to say, where doesn’t AI fit in?” explains Tom Tengan, director of digital enterprise at Siemens. “In almost every application that we have, artificial intelligence in some form is integrated into the solutions.”
By integrating AI so deeply, Siemens helps businesses plan for the future in a way they never could before.
“Siemens Xcelerator gives us the functionality that we need today, but it’s also a platform that’s connected to all the functionality that we need in the future,” says JetZero CEO Tom O’Leary. “Siemens Xcelerator allows JetZero to begin with the end in mind.”
Meet the Digital Twins
Siemens lets companies begin with the final product in mind by providing them with AI-assisted digital twin technology.
“A digital twin is a virtual representation of a product,” explains Tengan. “It allows you to visualize exactly what the product will look like, and how it will act. It allows you to do comprehensive simulations to verify the performance of the product.”
In JetZero’s case, that means designing and testing their new Z4 all-wing airplane virtually before any hardware is actually manufactured. That ease of testing has led to the Z4’s cutting-edge design, making it the first truly new major aircraft design in decades. And the results they’ve been able to achieve so far are impressive to say the least.
“First principal physics and aerodynamics can get you a 30 percent improvement over the traditional tube and wing shape that we’re used to flying on today,” says O’Leary. “And it turns out that once you change that shape, you give your engineers the opportunity to reevaluate every facet of commercial air travel and make it better.”
JetZero employs rigorous and efficient testing methods to drive innovation across all components of their new aircraft, including wing architecture and cabin configuration.
Building Smart Factories
Design is just one major challenge in bringing a new aircraft to market. While the aerodynamics and cost savings are impressive, when a design is finalized, it still needs to be manufactured at scale. And Siemens is there to help JetZero achieve those goals as well.
JetZero is utilizing Siemens Xcelerator's digital twin and AI technologies to build a factory of the future with real-time monitoring and automated quality control, designed to support current and future manufacturing needs.
“The digital twin can help you design the factory to have flexibility so you can anticipate how you can create your future designs even before you know what they look like,” says Tengan.
And by utilizing AI, the factory of the future totally changes how machinery is maintained. “It evaluates manufacturing processes and can gather critical information off of machines on the shop floor to anticipate how that machine is performing,” Tengan says. “It can tell you what stage or health that machine, or all your machines, are in, and anticipate what problems are going to occur if you don’t resolve vibration, heat generation, or bottlenecks.”
By integrating Siemens’ digital manufacturing platform from the ground up, JetZero’s new state-of-the-art manufacturing facility will allow for scalability of production processes and pave the way for Z4 production after its first full-scale test flight in 2027.
The Future of Industrial Design
From design to manufacture, Siemens Xcelerator puts the bleeding edge of industrial design at the fingertips of even small startups. What JetZero can do is just one example of how small businesses and manufacturers can level the playing field and compete with enterprise-level precision and efficiency.
While creating and testing new industrial designs used to require thousands of man hours and prohibitively expensive equipment, the advent of a digital platform that utilizes AI to create massive efficiencies is a game-changer. And if something as complex and challenging as a new type of aircraft can be created this way, it’s clear that there’s untapped potential just waiting to be exploited in nearly every product category.
Seeing what’s possible with Siemens, it’s hard to not be excited about the technology we’re about to see take off.
