REGENT's Electric Seagliders Land $5 Billion Order Book

REGENT, a Rhode Island startup building battery-electric seagliders, has accumulated $5 billion in orders for a craft that floats, foils and flies above the water — with first commercial deliveries targeted for late 2027 or early 2028. The 15,000-pound Viceroy variant carries 12 passengers and two crew, cruises at roughly 180 mph and covers about 180 miles on battery power alone. For coastal and island logistics markets that express networks have long ignored, that combination of speed, range and dock-side operability is the entire pitch.

The order book spans ferry operators, airlines, oil-and-gas companies and luxury travel customers, CEO and co-founder Billy Thalheimer said in a recent interview. REGENT's roadmap puts sea trials and commercial operations in 2028, after production tooling moves into the company's newly opened quarter-million-square-foot Rhode Island factory and Coast Guard certification wraps up.

Why a seaglider is a boat, not a plane

The regulatory classification is the quiet story here. Because seagliders stay within one wingspan of the water surface at all times, both the International Maritime Organization and the International Civil Aviation Organization treat them as wing-in-ground craft. That puts the U.S. Coast Guard — not the FAA — in the primary certification seat.

Thalheimer argues that path is faster and better suited to the vehicle's low-altitude operating environment than conventional aircraft certification. For an industry used to decade-long aviation approval cycles, a maritime route to market could compress the timeline considerably.

The craft operates in three modes: float, foil and fly. Takeoff occurs at around 50 mph using a "blown wing" system — small propellers distributed across the wing force high-speed prop wash over the surface, generating lift at low airspeed. The seaglider then climbs to a cruising altitude of about 30 feet above the water.

Triple-redundant fly-by-wire flight control systems handle pitch, roll and altitude automatically. Operators input only four commands: left, right, faster, slower.

Where the logistics case lands

REGENT's commercial argument centers on underserved island and coastal markets where next-day delivery infrastructure is thin or nonexistent. Thalheimer noted that Prime-style shipping does not reach several Hawaiian islands and is largely absent in island chains worldwide.

"We will service those. We can do some of the American island chains — Caribbean, Puerto Rico, stuff like that. Alaska, places where you don't have these sort of rush services. But then internationally, we can service every single coastline," Thalheimer said.

Because the craft uses existing docks and ports, ferry operators can adopt it without building new shore infrastructure — a meaningful capital advantage over port-reliant alternatives.

A hybrid variant aimed at defense customers is in development and would extend range to approximately 1,600 statute miles. That is enough, Thalheimer said, to hop between Pacific island chains for logistics, medevac and sensor missions.

Jones Act compliance built in from day one

On the Jones Act — the perennial friction point in U.S. coastal freight — REGENT says it is already compliant. The vehicles will be U.S.-built from the start at the new Rhode Island factory, and U.S. operations will use American-owned vessels and American crews, satisfying the cabotage law's conditions.

"We view it as a requirement and something we are doing anyways," Thalheimer said. That positions the seaglider to move goods and passengers between U.S. points — a lane foreign-flag operators cannot legally serve — without waivers or carve-outs.

For ferry operators, forwarders serving island chains and defense logistics planners, the next checkpoint is tangible: tooling into the Rhode Island plant, Coast Guard certification, and sea trials in 2028, with a $5 billion order book waiting on the other side.