A Look at Uber’s Flying Car Dream

Karem Aircraft Inc., founded by the inventor of the predator drone, said Tuesday that it’s developing a flying vehicle for Uber Technologies Inc.’s envisioned network of electric air taxis. That makes Karem the fifth company working on the project, with its new aircraft called the Butterfly.

While Uber isn’t building its own flying cars, the company has released three sets of design ideas as it pushes partners to experiment with new types of vehicles. Even the name for these new machines doesn’t seem certain. Uber Chief Product Officer Jeff Holden said onstage at the Uber Elevate conference in Los Angeles that he doubted the name “flying cars” would stick. After all, cars were once called horseless carriages, Holden said.