Building Giants: Building a hydrogen-powered electric plane, with Beyond Aero CEO Eloa Guillotin

Building Giants is our video series where you can meet the people behind Giant's purpose-driven companies, and hear the lessons so far from those on the way to building their companies into giants.

Beyond is building the world's first electric business aircraft using hydrogen propulsion. The aircraft will be powered by fuel cells, aiming to reach more than 1,500km (a range five times greater than that of a battery-powered aircraft), and producing water as a byproduct.

Earlier this month Beyond Aero announced a fundraise co-led by Giant and Bpifrance of $20M - bringing the company’s total capital raised to $44 million (with participation from Initialized Capital, Airbnb and Dropbox founders Nathan Blecharczyk and Arash Ferdowsi, as well as athletes including Olympic and World Cup winning athletes).

In this video, we get to know Eloa: from how she thinks about the CEO role to why she thinks people should be more ambitious. Plus, we turn the tables and hear from Jon Dishotsky, Partner at Giant, on what Giant saw in Beyond Aero, why we invested and why Eloa's strengths shone through during the pitch process.

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About Beyond Aero:

Beyond Aero is building the first electric business aircraft powered by hydrogen propulsion, enabling six passengers to fly up to 800 NM (1,500 km)—five times farther than a battery-powered aircraft. Founded in December 2020, the company is redesigning the architecture of a CS23 aircraft around hydrogen-electric propulsion, focusing on fuel cell technology, hydrogen tank integration, and advanced cooling systems. With offices in Toulouse, Paris, and Los Angeles, the startup boasts a team of over 50 highly qualified engineers from leading aerospace companies, and is actively recruiting.