Merlin Just Abandoned Its New Zealand Autonomy Plan To Chase 7,000 US Airline Cockpits

Merlin Labs is a US-based company developing systems that promise to solve the widely reported global pilot shortage in the form of autonomous flight systems.

Official response and confirmed impact

Its flagship product, the Merlin Pilot, is an artificial intelligence system that promises to safely operate aircraft from takeoff to landing using onboard software coupled with onboard sensors.

It's designed to be aircraft-agnostic, meaning that it can be integrated on any aircraft type in service, and it's now headed straight for the United States.

Merlin has been testing the Pilot in New Zealand with the hope of introducing autonomous commercial flights by 2027 in the country.

More recently, however, it withdrew its small aircraft Supplemental Type Certificate (STC) to instead focus on equipping large aircraft with Pilot, and it's aimed squarely at the US market.

The company has already won a contract from the USAF for AI co-pilot systems in collaboration with General Electric, so it will be coming to USAF cockpits.

How much further Pilot will go is what remains to be seen.

The Merlin Pilot is an AI-powered system that is designed to fully operate aircraft from takeoff to touchdown.