Financing and IPO
As of 2018, the registered office of Lilium GmbH was in Weßling (Wessling) near Gilching[17] in Bavaria, Germany. Lilium completed a new financing round of $90 million in September 2017.[18] From May 2018 to November 2019, the car designer Frank Stephenson was chief designer for Lilium.[19] He previously worked for BMW and designed various sports car brands. Also in 2018, Arnd Mueller,[20] previously Chief Brand Marketing Officer & GM Esprit Image GmbH-Member of the Executive Management Team, became VP Marketing of Lilium. He is to build the air taxi development company and its product into an international brand. In September 2018, Yann de Vries, formerly partner at Atomico, became the new VP of corporate development Lilium.[21]
In July 2019, Lilium announced London, UK as its base to develop its software engineering team.[22] The engineering team is led by Carlos Morgado, former chief technology officer of Just Eat.[23] Luca Benassi, a former Airbus executive with experience at Boeing and NASA, has been named Lilium's chief development engineer.[24] Yves Yemsi who worked as head of program quality for Airbus A350 aircraft has been hired as chief program officer.[25] Dirk Gebser has joined as vice president of production.[26]
In March 2020, Lilium raised $240 million in funding led by Tencent, with participation of previous backers such as Atomico, Freigeist and LGT.[27] In January 2021 it was reported that Lilium was seeking to become a listed company via a special-purpose acquisition company (SPAC, also called a "blank check" company);[28] the company completed a SPAC merger in September 2021.[29] The company also confirmed it was redesigning its aircraft.[30] Former Airbus CEO, Tom Enders, joined Lilium's board of directors in January 2021.[31] In early June 2022 it was announced that Klaus Roewe would become CEO of Lilium on August 1, replacing Daniel Wiegand.[32]
In late March 2021, Lilium announced a partnership with American aerospace supplier Honeywell during the SPAC IPO process. Honeywell is set to supply avionics components and also subscribe to shares in Lilium.[33]
In July 2021, according to research by Welt am Sonntag, it became known that the company had to correct its balance sheet.[34] After the recalculation, the startup loss for 2019 was no longer 42.8 million euros, but 75.4 million euros. A risk notice about the company's continuation was communicated. The merger with SPAC Qell took place in September 2021, and on September 15, Lilium N.V. was listed on NASDAQ for the first time.[35]
In August 2021, the Brazilian airline Azul signed a letter of intent for 220 Lilium Jet seven-seaters.[36]
Losses and insolvency
At the time of the IPO, the company had significant losses and no significant revenue; the loss for the fiscal year 2020 totaled 188 million euros. Nevertheless, the company was valued at $2.4 billion (after the addition of approximately 430 million euros in liquidity). For the year 2021, a cash outflow of 217 million euros and remaining liquidity of 400 million euros were reported.[37]
In October 2022, the company reported a loss of 123.7 million euros for the first half of 2022. The total loss since the company's inception was estimated at 841 million euros. As of July 1, 2022, there was liquidity of approximately 230 million euros.[38] In November 2022, the company secured an additional $119 million in financing through a capital increase and simultaneously forecasted a further uncovered capital requirement of $540 million until the planned market entry in 2025.[39]
At the end of March 2023, the company reported a loss of 253 million euros for the fiscal year 2022.[40] In April 2023, the company informed Handelsblatt
Takeover by investor group
On 24 December 2024, it was announced that a consortium of investors, Mobile Uplift Corporation GmbH, would buy parts of the insolvent company.[48] After the restructuring, 775 of 1,000 jobs lost would be retained.[49]
In January 2025, Mobile Uplift expected the takeover to be completed in the first quarter of the year and announced that it would invest more than 200 million euros to finance Lilium until it entered the market.[50][51]
On February 21, 2025, Severin Tatarczyk announced in internal communications that the company had filed for insolvency.[52] The money that was promised by Marian Boček never materialized.
