管理層發言
Greetings, and welcome to the Eve Holding, Inc. First Quarter 2026 Earnings Call. As a reminder, this conference is being recorded. It is now my pleasure to introduce your host, Lucio Aldworth, Head of Investor Relations. Thank you. You may begin.
Thank you, operator. Good morning, everyone. This is Lucio Aldworth, the Director of Investor Relations at Eve, and I wanted to welcome everyone to our first quarter 2026 earnings conference call. Our CEO, Johann Bordais; and CFO, Eduardo Couto, are joining me on the call today. After their prepared remarks, we will open the call for questions. At that point, Luiz Valentini, our Chief Technology Officer, will also join in to address some more technical questions. We have a deck with a few slides and additional pictures that showcase our achievements in the quarter, including, of course, the more recent stages of the test flights of our full-scale prototype. The deck is available on our site at ir.eveairmobility.com. So please feel free to download it and follow along. In fact, we just published on our website today a video of one of the more recent flights that features some more complex on-air maneuvers. You might want to check that out as well. Let me first mention that today's conference call includes statements about events or circumstances that have not yet occurred. These are primarily based on our current expectations and projections regarding future events and financial trends that will affect our business and future economic performance. These forward-looking statements are based on current expectations and involve risks and uncertainties that could cause financial results to differ substantially from those expressed or implied in this conference call. We undertake no obligation to update publicly or revise any forward-looking statements because of new information, future events, or other factors. For a more detailed list of these risks and uncertainties, please refer to our SEC filings, which are available on our website. Now I'll turn it over to our CEO, Johann Bordais. Johann?
Thank you, Lucio. Good morning, everyone, and welcome to the first quarter 2026 conference call. This quarter was especially significant. As many of you know, we achieved the inaugural flight of our engineering prototype last December after a thorough development and a series of bench and ground tests. This major milestone validated not only our building-block concept by extensively testing every part, but also the integration of critical systems such as fly-by-wire and fixed-pitch lifter rotors. The successful first flight launched an intensive flight test campaign. Our prototype completed 59 flights and logged nearly 2.5 hours in the air with multiple days of two flights and the completion of all planned hover phase objectives. Moving to Slide 3. More than quantity, our flight campaign has also excelled in quality. Every flight is planned to test and validate a specific aircraft component or flight metric. In total, our engineers have already validated 130 different performance points. The prototype has reached 215 feet above the ground and is now moving forward at 30 knots. As an example of the envelope expansion, our first flight in December was stationary with the aircraft climbing to 40 feet. Besides flying more frequently, longer, higher and faster since the first flight, we have also introduced multiple on-air maneuvers to the protocols. We use a building-block approach in both design and flight testing, which means we break complex systems into smaller parts, test each unit until it reaches the needed maturity and then build on this component. Each test validates specific points and allows progression to the next level, more complex phases of the campaign. As such, the aircraft has tested and validated the Autoland feature fully controlled by the fly-by-wire system. We have also performed difficult maneuvers in all four axes with consistent behavior, allowing continuous envelope expansion. On Slide 4, the flight campaign has delivered meaningful knowledge gain to date. Most importantly, we confirmed that our predictive models are reliable and precise, enabling safe and confident campaign advancement. Ground effect behaved somewhat differently from initial expectations, but loads remain within expectations. These common small deviations help us further refine and improve our engineering models. We have better-than-expected results for motor thrust and battery performance with noise and vibration meeting our expectations. The key takeaway is that we remain on track for further envelope expansion and more complex flights. Speaking of which, Slide 5 shows the next steps in the engineering prototype test campaign for this year. The flights up to now have been in hover mode up to 30 knots and all were completed successfully on schedule with approximately 60 flights. During the remainder of the second quarter, we will upload a refined flight computer software and perform final ground tests on the pusher and actuators. This will ensure that they are fully integrated with all the other aircraft systems in preparation to initiate transition flight. Besides software upgrades, we will also perform mandatory structural ground tests and lay-up activities that are required for the transition phase and that will last a few weeks. This is a critical opportunity that will help us validate methods, set up instrumentation and test techniques to continue advancing. In a nutshell, this structural and software upload phase is an investment in the maturity, safety and predictability of the coming transition and certification path. The transition phase will also be gradual. We will start with a partial transition, progressively increasing speed. The lifters will be engaged to provide the aircraft with the necessary vertical support. At the end of this phase, we plan to accelerate the aircraft to a full transition speed above 85 knots. At this point, the entire lift of the aircraft will be provided by the wing, meaning the aircraft will be wing-borne with lifter motors off. This is the aircraft's ultimate mission: take off vertically, transition to wing-borne flight and then transition back to vertical flight for landing procedures. After transition testing, we will introduce controlled failures such as motor shutdown to observe system reactions and refine the safety procedures and the pilot protocols. Meanwhile, we are concluding the critical design review with our suppliers for each component that will be featured in our upcoming performing prototypes. This will allow us to release drawings and continue manufacturing components within the required specs to start testing our conforming vehicle in 2027. We continue to mature our flight test campaign and advance our engineering prototype this year while gaining greater visibility into the certification plans for our conforming vehicles. This suggests that certification and entering service are more likely in 2028 as we will need to fly our conforming vehicles for 12 months to complete all necessary certification tests. It is important to mention that this greater visibility gives us more confidence in the new schedule and lowers its risk. The new timeline is also important to incorporate knowledge gained from the engineering prototype into the conforming prototype and guarantee the maturity and performance level of our Eve-100 eVTOL, especially for range, noise, reliability, payload and lower operating cost. We are now confident that we can deliver an aircraft that is very competitive and well designed for urban air mobility missions. In parallel, on Slide 6, we continue to engage with authorities worldwide to advance certification for our eVTOL. We have recently performed a demonstration at the Gaviao Peixoto Embraer facility in Brazil for several Brazilian authorities, including the President of Brazil. We also met with both Brazil ANAC and the U.S. FAA certification authorities at our Melbourne, Florida office to continue discussing our certification timeline. We also met with Japan JCAB and ANAC to strengthen cooperation between the two agencies. Lastly, we formally applied for our eVTOL type certificate with EASA. Moving on to Slide 7. We attended VERTICON in Atlanta, the world's largest helicopter conference. Our goal was to raise awareness of our eVTOL among helicopter operators. We believe that these operators will be very early adopters and see an attractive short-term commercial opportunity with them. Slide 8 shows our total preorder backlog with approximately 2,700 aircraft valued at about USD 13.5 billion at list price. Out of the 27 customers, we also have LOIs with 14 different customers for our eVTOL aftermarket services and support as well as 21 different potential customers for our air traffic management solution called Vector. Now I will hand over to our CFO, Edu, for the 2026 first quarter financial review.
Thanks, Johann. Eve ended first quarter 2026 with a record cash position of $441 million and total liquidity of $578 million, including about $136 million in undrawn credit from the Brazilian Development Bank. This is our highest cash level since the IPO, driven by a new five-year $150 million loan raised in January. This added liquidity should support operations through 2028 without new funding. We're also working with Embraer to find new synergies to reduce our cash burn from 2026 to 2028. Our initial review indicates that we can achieve $100 million to $150 million in incremental synergies in the next three years, likely reducing cash usage and extending our cash runway. We already started to implement these actions. Our 2026 expected cash burn remains at $225 million to $275 million, excluding the new potential synergies under implementation. Now moving to Slide 10, just to highlight some of our numbers. Eve invested $59 million in R&D during the first quarter 2026, mainly for eVTOL development. SG&A expenses totaled $7 million for the quarter. Including R&D and SG&A, Eve's net loss for first quarter 2026 was $69 million. Finally, as mentioned previously, we ended the quarter with $441 million in cash and $578 million in total liquidity. Cash consumption in the first quarter was $69 million, but this figure includes approximately $11 million in service payments expected to have been paid in the fourth quarter of 2025. Excluding this additional payment in the first quarter 2026, our cash consumption was $57 million and in line with the low end of our guidance. With that, we conclude our remarks, and I would like to open the call for questions. Operator, please proceed.
分析師問答
The first question is from Savanthi Syth from Raymond James.
Maybe, Edu, first, just on the synergies, could you provide a little bit of color on kind of what type of actions those are? And just to make sure that the $100 million to $150 million you're targeting over a three-year period, is that coming off of a base of like roughly $250 million per year over the next few years? Is that how we should think?
Yes, you're correct. We did a big workshop in Brazil a couple of weeks ago. There were more than 200 people involved from both Eve and Embraer. We basically explored, I would say, four main areas. We explored the Eve structure — we have a lot of costs at Eve. We also explored all the services that Embraer provides to us. A third pocket was suppliers and all activities we do with third-party suppliers. And the fourth one was industrialization. So after doing this deep workshop, we were able to initially identify this $100 million to $150 million that we expect to capture between 2026 to 2028. That would be a reduction in the expected cash burn that we were planning for the next three years. And you're right, we believe these actions will help us to reduce the forecasted cash burn in the years ahead.
That's helpful. And maybe if Valentini is there, just on the means of compliance, I know last earnings call you talked about working on two fronts. Just wondering if there's any kind of update on that. And related to that, you noted that some suppliers have already initiated performance certification rehearsal tests. Just wondering if you could elaborate a little bit more on that.
Sure. Savi, this is Luiz Valentini. We continue to work with ANAC and also with the FAA on discussions regarding the means of compliance. I think we've had good progress recently. We've proposed all of the means of compliance to ANAC. They are inside the certification plans we call. Basically, we've been discussing them one by one, and we have all of them proposed. We believe that we are at around 90% of the means of compliance agreed, which puts us in a good position to start working on the detailed design of the test campaigns in order to show compliance with requirements. We also were able to find a good agreement on the noise certification requirement, which is not part of the certification basis but is an important part of the certification and operation of the vehicle. So we believe that it's still on par with the development of the vehicle itself. With respect to other authorities, we've also been engaging with the FAA, as we communicated previously, but most of the alignment work on the means of compliance is done directly with ANAC being the primary certification authority.
The next question is from Andres Sheppard from Cantor Fitzgerald.
Congrats on the quarter. I wanted to touch on the flight campaign for a minute. So just to make sure I have it right, we're targeting first full transition flight in Q3. So I guess, what are the milestones leading up to it? And how confident are we in that milestone in Q3?
This is Luiz Valentini. We've been flying quite a bit, as we've shown, all of the flights in the hover flight phase. We've been pretty excited not only with the pace of the campaign, but also with the results that are coming out that make us confident in moving forward with the tests. The next few weeks we'll be focused on testing some of the integration of the systems on the ground. So we've been planning a shift from a period of many flights to now a period of tests on the ground. That will focus on making sure that the flight control surfaces work well with the flight control laws connected with the pusher and the lifters — all of that connected. We will also have more ground tests that focus on the structure and the airframe of the vehicle to make sure the vehicle is ready for the larger envelope of flight that we will start from Q2 to Q3. Of course, there is a lot to be learned as we move into this new transition flight phase. We are confident and excited by the way the vehicle has been performing relative to our expectations. But there is still a lot to be found out on this expansion as we move forward. So we are planning this preparation phase very carefully to increase the chances of successfully doing the transition. Again, that's very important, not only for the transition itself, but in the way that it brings knowledge for us to increase the maturity of the Eve-100 design as we progress to building the certification prototypes and moving to the certification flight test campaign.
Got it. Wonderful. I really appreciate all that context. Very helpful. And maybe just one quick follow-up. Just on the backlog, can you remind us the strategy for this year? Is the plan to continue to increase the backlog or are we happy with the number and that it will be more about converting those LOIs? Just curious how you're thinking about it for this year.
Yes. When it comes to the backlog, we still have the strongest preorder book with 2,700 aircraft at this stage. We understand the number of LOIs and the spread of our customers and the customer profile is what we need. It's a variety of first-mile, last-mile operations; it's also sightseeing; it's also organ transportation — different types of missions. I think it's the right balance across different parts of the world: Australia, Japan, Brazil, and the United States. We're very comfortable with our portfolio right now. We have demonstrated that we have the right solution because we're very focused, based on our strong Embraer experience, on how operations will be run. That's something that we work hard on to make sure we have the ecosystem ready. This is what has driven this large order book. The strategy for this year is to engage the customers so they can move to firm contracts, so then they can also engage with their local authority together with Eve, and also the stakeholders to prepare the air service. Certification is really the starting line. The game will begin when we are certifying and delivering those aircraft and then they will be able to operate with the lowest operating cost and highest utilization. This is how we will be starting urban air mobility. First will be Revo and then AirX as we announced this year at the Singapore Air Show in Japan, and we are also working with other customers in Brazil and the United States.
The next question is from Sheila Kahyaoglu from Jefferies.
This is Kira on for Sheila. I appreciate the added color on the flight test progress. You mentioned greater engagement with suppliers with the pickup in R&D. Could you walk us through how conversations with suppliers have developed since flight test began? And how is work progressing on the supplier side at this point in the campaign?
Sheila, this is Luiz Valentini. What we've been doing with suppliers is making sure that we have the parts and their systems optimized for the vehicle to meet its product requirements. The flight test campaign helps us gather data on vehicle behavior and flight, and on the behavior of systems — for example, how the temperature of the battery behaves during flights. With that data, we can go back to the supplier and use this information to make sure that what they are developing will lead the Eve-100 to meet its product goals. The interaction now focuses on ensuring their products allow us to reach our targets; the flight test data brings more clarity and confidence to the data we are exchanging with them. Based on this, we are moving forward to finalize system designs and make sure everything integrates to satisfy the Eve-100 goals. Once we are done with that, we can release drawings for manufacturing and then manufacture the production prototypes. So that's the connection between the flight test campaign and what we expect to do once we're past this phase.
The next question is from Andre Madrid from BTIG.
I wanted to ask a bit more about the binding orders. At the end of the year, could you maybe point to what dollar figure of binding orders would make you call it a really successful year? How many of what's in backlog right now would you have to convert to binding orders?
Thanks, Andre. We have two binding agreements right now. The first one is Revo with up to 50 aircraft firm. We also have AirX, a similar operation for that customer. As you can see, it's roughly $500 million under binding agreements right now. There are some product development payments associated to them and milestones tied to the product development. This is how we've been structuring the deals. We need to move at the right time. Given it's a high-utilization aircraft and based on the safety level standard of commercial aviation, customers expect certain commitments from the vehicle. As we progress through the testing campaign and the conforming prototype and certification, we'll define more precisely with customers how the agreements will work and how the operations will be structured.
Got it. If I could follow up on that, you mentioned PDPs. I know you don't usually guide this, but is there any more color on the cadence of those flowing in?
Yes, it's Edu here. In terms of down payments, as we signed the binding agreements, we already received an initial down payment. We expect that those down payments will continue 18, 12 and 6 months prior to delivery. In total, we're anticipating we can receive up to 30% to 40% of the total value of the vehicle before delivery and then receive the balance at delivery.
Very similar to what industry practice is for commercial and executive aviation.
The next question is from Austin Moeller from Canaccord Genuity.
Just my first question on Vector. Is that being actively evaluated by ANAC for approval? And can that be integrated immediately into Brazil's national airspace system once your aircraft are delivered to customers for the first time?
Yes. Vector is definitely part of the ecosystem and the solution that we're providing for our customers. It comes with modules like any air traffic management system, and we can start urban air mobility operations using the current air traffic management system in place. The idea is that as we scale up, we will need a robust solution — and when I say we, this is the aerospace industry broadly — as thousands or hundreds of thousands of low-altitude vehicles come into the airspace. It's a journey and goes along with the scale of UAM. Our first module is focused on managing vertiports or helipads because our strategy is to start now. We delivered the first module to Revo, and they tested it at the Grand Prix of Sao Paulo at the end of last year, which was successful. Then we'll move to the fleet level and then toward certifiable software together with ANAC and DECEA, who manages air traffic control in Brazil. Our experience on Vector is strong: we have significant expertise and we're developing Vector together with Atech, a fully owned Embraer company that developed the air traffic management software used in Brazil.
Okay. And if we think about the production schedule for the certification prototypes, I understand there will be one finished by the end of the year. But how should we think about the cadence of how many will be produced between now and 2028?
We will start assembling the conforming prototype and expect to finish it probably in the first semester of next year, with the first flight with a pilot on board being an important milestone targeted for mid next year or the early second semester for that conforming prototype. After that, we will be producing and delivering roughly one prototype per month up to about six prototypes.
The next question is from Marcelo Motta from JPMorgan.
Just two follow-ups. First, in the release in the fourth quarter, you were talking about a $21 million deferral payment to Embraer, and this quarter this converted to $11 million. Is the $10 million difference for next quarter or was there some readjustment on the amount? Second, regarding the test campaign, you mentioned trying to get to 300 test flights this year. Is that still the level you're targeting, or what are you expecting in terms of number of tests or hours?
Motta, how are you? In terms of the accounts payable, you're correct. We closed last year with $21 million that were supposed to be paid in the fourth quarter. We paid the whole $21 million, but then on the invoices of the first quarter, there was $10 million that slipped to the right. So we pretty much recovered more than half of what was a carryover from last year. Your math is correct.
Motta, with respect to the number of flights, yes, we are still considering 300 flights as a reference for the engineering prototype test campaign this year. Of course, this is flexible as we may decide to test more things, for example modifications to the vehicle — different propellers or different lifters. The vehicle allows us to do that, so there's a lot of flexibility. The 300 flights are the number we consider that will bring the knowledge we need for the development of the Eve-100 and also to progress with expansion of the envelope. We believe that with that campaign, we can demonstrate the vehicle and its characteristics and bring the knowledge needed for the development and manufacturing of the conforming prototypes. Keep in mind this number is a reference and we may change it as we progress and decide to test more items if needed.
The next question is from Amit Dayal from H.C. Wainwright.
Just going back to the Embraer synergies, can you clarify whether this includes technology or personnel? Where are these synergies coming from?
Yes, that's a good question. It's a broad range. We are looking at a bunch of different things: how we can use existing assets better, existing facilities, and how we can allocate work between different teams more efficiently. We also examined details of the flight test campaign, associated CapEx and OpEx. It was a very big effort with more than 200 people involved and hundreds of actions. That's the beauty of being part of a big group like Embraer: when you bring everyone together and look at things in detail, you can identify gains and synergies you weren't seeing before. We mapped the $100 million to $150 million potential savings to capture over three years and we are now moving forward with the plan.
Okay. Just a follow-up on that, Edu. Will this impact SG&A more or R&D more — where will the cost synergies show up?
It's both. There are synergies in being more efficient in assembling the vehicles and in development activities, and there are efficiencies in general expenses and third-party services. There are also opportunities in industrialization — not only assembling conforming prototypes but on production going forward. So it includes both R&D and SG&A, and there will be some CapEx as well.
I appreciate the question. It's important to understand that within Embraer and Eve there is a lean philosophy in place. That program was implemented years ago, and it's part of Embraer's culture. We continuously work on efficiency through Kaizens and continuous improvement. I've seen this over my 25 years at Embraer. It's how you keep improving and finding efficiencies over time, and it's one of the benefits Eve gets from being part of the group.
One last one. On the cost of the aircraft side, roughly it's translating to around $5 million per aircraft right now with the numbers you shared. Have any inflationary factors been built into this given global price trends? How might pricing per aircraft evolve in the next few years?
Yes, the list price is $5 million. As we progress on development, we're gaining confidence on vehicle specs — range, noise, payload — and we are getting more visibility on COGS. Given the simplicity of our design, the lift-plus-cruise architecture and focus on urban missions, we believe our vehicle will be extremely competitive on COGS. We're working with suppliers of critical components to ensure COGS stay within the range that allows us to sell at the $5 million list price and be profitable. We keep challenging ourselves and our suppliers to achieve a lower-cost vehicle and to leverage Embraer's supply chain and our large suppliers' supply chains to remain competitive.
Yes. From program design, major systems are covered by suppliers and these are lifetime contracts. We don't just develop prototypes; we ensure operations are covered to guarantee our customers a competitive aircraft. We include inflation-adjustment formulas in long-term contracts that allow us to control costs, including aftermarket, so we have good visibility and are comfortable with the $5 million vehicle list price.
There are no further questions at this time. I would like to turn the floor back over to Lucio Aldworth for closing comments.
Great. Thank you, Sashi, and everyone who joined the call today. As you can see, we accomplished several important milestones this past quarter. There is much more to come, and our upcoming achievements will be more visible to the investment community from now on. It's going to be a very exciting next few months for Eve as a whole. We'll keep you updated on our progress over the next few quarters, and we look forward to meeting you at upcoming events. If you have any questions, as always, please feel free to reach out. Thank you, and have a good day.
This concludes today's teleconference. You may disconnect your lines at this time. Thank you for your participation.