Posted on 09/30/2025 1:07:15 PM PDT by Red Badger
Executive jet operator Flexjet has been unveiled as the launch customer for the Phantom 3500, the revolutionary executive jet being developed by Otto Aerospace.
The announcement was made during the UP.Summit, an event dedicated to aerospace innovation, which took place in Bentonville, Arkansas, from September 28 to 29, 2025.
This is a landmark deal for Otto Aerospace (previously Otto Aviation) and secures an order for 300 aircraft from one of the largest executive fleet operators in the United States. Flexjet will also become an authorized service provider for Otto Aerospace’s aircraft.
The Phantom 3500 has a clean-sheet design which encapsulates decades of work by Otto Aerospace in the field of laminar flow. This is a physics principle through which air moves smoothly along a surface, minimizing drag and turbulence.
By optimizing for laminar flow, Otto Aerospace claims its aircraft is able to reduce fuel and emissions by 60% compared to traditional aircraft in the same category.
In this regard, the Phantom 3500 will be competing with business jets such as the Embraer Praetor 500, the Cessna Citation X, and the Bombardier Challenger 3500.
Another singular characteristic of the Phantom 3500 is that, in order to achieve this laminar flow effect, it does not have windows along its fuselage. However, Otto Aerospace is compensating for this by providing what could be defined as a next generation cabin experience, making extensive use of wall screens and lighting to provide a comparable, and in some regards even enhanced, experience.
The Phantom 3500 design is an evolution of the Celera 500L, an experimental eye-catching aircraft with a teardrop shape and a single rear propeller, which Otto Aerospace used to flight test the laminar flow concept between 2018 and 2021.
The Phantom 3500 is expected to take its first flight in 2027, with certification and deliveries towards 2030. In June 2025, during the Paris Air Show, Otto Aerospace announced that it had received financial backing from the state of Florida to build an industrial scale manufacturing facility adjacent to Cecil Airport (VQQ) in Jacksonville.
Flexjet, which is part of the OneSky private aviation group, operates a fleet of around 300 jets of all sizes, ranging from the Embraer Phenom 300 light jet to the ultra-long-range Gulfstream G700.
Earlier in 2025, Flexjet placed another major order, valued at $7 billion at catalogue prices, for 182 Embraer aircraft (plus 30 options), including an unspecified mix of Phenom 300E and Praetor 500 and 600 aircraft.
AVIATION PING!................
He’s movin’ on up!.............
We did a tour of Duncan Aviation years ago and I remember the person giving the tour talking about the person that engineered the wing flairs at the end of the wings. If I recall to have them on your plane you had to spend six figures (I think??) to use them but the fuel savings out weighed the cost. I’m sure there’s a Freeper that has a better idea of cost.
It looks like a TeleTubbie.
Winglets.
It looks like an Orca................or Rosie O’Donnell...........
100% correct, thank you.
It looks like it could be underpowered by those two little engines.
Thought the same thing..............Unless they have some new engine tech.............
It is almost Cousin Eddie time.
- You serious, Clark?
- Art, you want to load me up with a little more there. It is good.
Strange engine placement.
A flying whale
Five , Four years to deliver ?
I don’t understand why it can’t have windows.
I’ve been following the Celera 500L for a few years now, and their initial claims sound impressive. Let’s see how it operates in the real world.
Oh goody, a flying MRI tube.
I suspect the higher than noromal placement is to avoid laminar flow contamination from the wing. On Gulfstreams, for example, the engines are placed a little lower on the airframe. I also suspect that the T-tail will have to be heavily reinforced due to the higher placement, above the higher engines.
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