Joby Aviation (NYSE:JOBY) released first-quarter financial results and hosted an earnings call on Tuesday. Read the complete transcript below.
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The full earnings call is available at https://event.choruscall.com/mediaframe/webcast.html?webcastid=M3xWNZoj
Summary
Joby Aviation successfully completed the SR3 audit with the FAA, marking a significant milestone towards final certification.
The company executed full transition flights with their turbine electric VTOL aircraft, demonstrating its capabilities to the US Army.
Joby Aviation ended Q1 with a strong balance sheet, including $2.5 billion in cash and equivalents, and reported a net loss of $110 million.
Strategic partnerships were highlighted, including collaboration with Airspace Intelligence for air traffic control modernization.
The company is ramping up manufacturing efforts, notably in Ohio, and focuses on meeting demand for EVTOL operations.
Management expressed optimism about future passenger operations and highlighted successful demonstrations in New York and San Francisco.
Full Transcript
OPERATOR
During the quarter, we successfully completed our SR3 audit with the FAA, a milestone years in the making. The audit reviewed our aircraft design and safety requirements, test results and development standards and confirmed that the test results we are producing meet the FAA’s expectations for the final phase of certification. This achievement, along with so much of what we’ve discussed today, is testament to the incredible work our teams have done over the last five years and I’d like to take this opportunity to thank Didier for his remarkable contributions. He will be with us through early July and will continue to support us as an advisor after that. As we look ahead, we are promoting a number of our leaders to optimize our organizational efficiency and velocity. Looking more broadly across our product platform, we also completed full transition flights with our turbine electric VTOL aircraft during the quarter, including 148 mile flight at our max takeoff weight of 2,400kg. As a reminder, this aircraft is built on our standard electric S4 platform and introduces a gas turbine for increased range and payload. Achieving transition is one of the hardest technical challenges faced in the development of this technology, but by using our existing platform, our own core technologies and our experienced team, we’ve been able to deliver it in record time. That allowed us to demonstrate its maneuverability and endurance to the US army last month alongside our partner L3Harris. There are live contract opportunities in this space today with clear capability gaps and strong demand for this type of system. That same operational experience and aircraft maturity is key to the partnership we announced with ASI, or Airspace Intelligence last month. ASI has quietly built a reputation as a true leader in airspace modernization with their High Fidelity 4D modeling and AI tools, and they are one of three companies currently competing to provide the software foundation for the FAA’s brand new air traffic control system. While our aircraft was designed to operate comfortably within the current system, we have always believed there are better ways to deliver higher volume EVTOL operations, and we are very excited about the ongoing work to modernize air traffic control led by Secretary Duffy. Alongside ASI, we plan to run real life demonstrations of how scaled operations can be safely integrated into complex and high traffic airspace later this year. This work is also an important step towards fully autonomous EVTOL operations. With our Superpilot stack, we already have the technology to do this. What’s been missing is an airspace management system that allows for fully digital deconfliction of the airspace. Our work with ASI should help pave the way for this important next step and if it’s successful, it should mean safer, lower cost aerial transportation for EVTOL and every other aircraft that uses US Airspace. We close out the first quarter with a very strong balance sheet. Incredible progress across all areas of our business and the clearest path we’ve ever had to beginning passenger operations. With our recent New York and San Francisco demos behind us and the EIPP program ahead of us, communities across America aren’t just reading about the future of flight or hearing about it on calls like these anymore. They’re seeing it in the skies above their own cities. And as I said to our team when we rang the opening bell at the New York Stock Exchange last week, just half a mile from where our aircraft landed an hour later, we are quite literally ringing in the next golden age of flight. Rodrigo, over to you.
Joban
Thank you, Joban and good evening everyone. As Jovan just described, Q1 was a quarter of steady progress. Last week in New York, I had the privilege of meeting many of you in person, including investors and analysts joining this call today. Together we witnessed something remarkable. Successful flights, demonstrations, connecting Wall street in Midtown to JFK in minutes. Real aircraft flying, real routes, all made possible through our BLADE infrastructure in partnership with the faa, local government and key infrastructure partners. It was a glimpse of the future and I could not be more excited to be part of this team. But moments like that don’t happen by accident. They’re the result of years of deliberate investment and disciplined execution. And from a finance perspective, my job is to ensure that continues by funding, certification, scaling manufacturing, and supporting commercial launch while preserving the financial flexibility to execute. What you saw in New York last week and in the Bay Area the month before is the combination of deliberate investment and disciplined execution producing tangible progress in the market. Now let me walk you through our first quarter financial results in more detail. We entered 2026 with a strong momentum on the balance sheet. We ended the first quarter with approximately $2.5 billion in cash, cash equivalents and short term investments, including 1.3 billion in net proceeds raised during the quarter from our equity and convertible offerings and warrants exercised by Delta Airlines. Our Q1 use of cash, cash equivalents and short term investments, excluding net proceeds from Q1 Capital Raises, total approximately $195 million. This includes 32 million of net purchase cost for our new Ohio manufacturing facility. After financing, the gross purchase price was 62 million and we financed roughly half of that at attractive terms, bringing the net cash impact for the quarter to 32 million excluding that one time purchase. Consistent with how we communicated our first half guidance, Q1 cash use was $163 million compared to $157 million in Q4. Additional detail is available in our Q1 shareholder letter. Total property and equipment investment in the quarter was approximately $78 million. Of that $62 million reflects the gross Ohio purchase with the remaining $16 million supporting facility, build out, tooling and production equipment for our manufacturing ramp. Overall Q1 spend is in line with our first half 2026 guidance of 340 to 370 million dollars excluding the one time Ohio purchase exactly as previewed and we remain on track within that range. Step back for a moment. The capital deployment you see this quarter reflects the choice to lead, not to follow. We are running a multi year manufacturing ramp, an active type certification program and a global operations build out and integration of late all in parallel. Few companies in our industry are in a position to execute all four at once. We can because of years of foundational investment and we can do it sustainably because the strength of our balance sheet. On a GAAP basis we reported a Q1 net loss of $110 million, a $12 million improvement compared to the $122 million net loss in Q4. The sequential improvement …
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