Aju Business Daily

SEOUL -- Pamela Cohn, who founded Ascension Global, a consulting firm in the U.S aviation industry, has been appointed as vice president to lead global strategy and operations at the urban air mobility division of South Korea's Hyundai auto group which has launched a project to develop flying cars.

Cohn will come together with a team of urban air mobility (UAM) experts from Ascension Global, the auto group said in a statement, "I believe Hyundai Motor Group is uniquely positioned to advance this sector and put citizens and communities at the heart of its ecosystem," Cohn was quoted as saying.

Hyundai's UAM division has been led by Shin Jae-won, a former NASA researcher who once oversaw a $725 million program to lead many new aeronautics research initiatives such as supersonic X-plane and urban air mobility.

"We are fortunate to have Pamela join our leadership team," Shin said. "With her strong reputation in the industry, firsthand knowledge of operational, strategic and policy opportunities in the UAM space, and track record of delivering results in traditional and future aviation, we are excited for her to scale our global footprint."

At CES 2020, an electronics trade fair in Las Vegas, Hyundai unveiled its first electric air vehicle concept, S-A1, through collaboration with Uber, the world’s largest mobility company. The air vehicle concept was created in part through Uber's open design process, a NASA-inspired approach that jump-starts innovation by publicly releasing vehicle design concepts so any company can use them to innovate their air taxi models and engineering technologies.