Star Trek was right—according to San Diego–based aerospace manufacturer Natilus, a more sustainable aircraft looks like something straight out of sci-fi.
CEO Aleksey Matyushev co-founded Natilus in 2016 with his longtime friend Anatoly Star after the two noticed inefficiencies with airfreight cargos. “Airplanes were [filling] out on volume before they top out on weight,” Matyushev says. “That problem has been persisting, and business has changed. Airplanes have not.”
The two identified that wasted cargo space drove up fuel usage, hiked flight prices, and contributed to global warming. So Matyushev and Star leaned into a more efficient shape for aircraft: a blended-wing-body (BWB) that reduces drag and increases lift. Per the company, this design carries more cargo, flies faster, uses 30 percent less fuel, and costs 50 percent less to operate than traditional planes. Matyushev hopes their model—hitting the market as early as 2027—will drive sustainable development in the industry, making flights cheaper for customers.
“It’s time to do something new and different, especially through the lens of sustainability,” Matyushev says.
Natilus is developing two products featuring the BWB. Kona is a regional freight cargo aircraft capable of traveling up to 900 nautical miles. It has a cargo payload of 3.8 metric tons—2.5 times larger than commercial aircraft. The company says that its innovative, more aerodynamic design means lower fuel consumption and increased efficiency.
“We found quite a bit of [interest in Kona] in [northern Canada], where you have small, regional communities like the Indigenous folks there,” Matyushev explains. “Getting them food, supplies, mining equipment—it’s a really good platform for that.”
The company’s passenger plane, Horizon, expands on Kona’s cargo capacity while carrying up to 200 people—the same as a Boeing 737, while producing half of the carbon emissions, Natilus says, thanks to its smaller engines (which consume less fuel) and unique shape. Traditional planes are less efficient because they rely solely on their wings to lift them up. BWB aircraft split that responsibility with the body of the plane.
Though it’ll be a few years before delivery and airline companies receive Natilus’s planes, Matyushev’s team of 15 engineers is working on creating a full-scale prototype of the Horizon by 2026. The company will try out the design in the San Diego Air & Space Museum’s world-class wind tunnel system. Used primarily for commercial and military testing, the system is capable of replicating wind speeds up to 270 MPH. Test data will allow Natilus to provide investors with proof of Kona and Horizon’s real-world capabilities.
Meanwhile, the company plans on expanding from 15 employees to 50 in the next year. With increased production, Natilus hopes to force competitors in the aerospace industry into more sustainable practices.
“There’s a sustainability conversation that has pushed a lot of brand new technologies onto the table, which is great,” Matyushev says. “I don’t think it’ll be ‘one winner take all.’ But it seems that, finally, we’re talking about it. That’s a very important starting point.”
