As a champion of clean energy, Valery Miftakhov found himself on a self-inflicted guilt trip when he was piloting small planes and helicopters. The Siberian-born, Princeton- and Stanford- educated physicist became fascinated with clean transportation and clean fuel while living in Silicon Valley and witnessing the emergence of Tesla and a technical focus on decarbonization.
Having already created a company that made electric vehicles more efficient to charge–and landed a spot on Inc.’s annual ranking of the fastest-growing private companies in the U.S. in 2017–he’s turning his eyes to the skies with another startup, ZeroAvia. “With land transport rapidly decarbonizing, air transport is quickly becoming the leading emission source, so we must find ways to make aviation more sustainable,” says Miftakhov, who will serve as ZeroAvia’s CEO.
