FlightGlobal reported that the firm was now only pushing for certification of its hydrogen fuel cell system in 2027 rather than its originally planned complete powertrain, after around half of its workforce faced redundancies.

It comes after ZeroAvia raised an undisclosed sum in December to increase its cash runway by two years.

As a result of the limited funds and smaller workforce, the company will no longer pursue the development of both an electric propulsion system and the full ZA600 fuel cell powertrain.

ZeroAvia originally planned to certify the ZA600 system in 2024. But now, it expects just the fuel cell system to be cleared to fly by 2027.

Consequently, the ZA600 powertrain will slip by 12-24 months, FlightGlobal reported.

This will also have a knock-on effect for its larger 2MW ZA2000 system, which was slated to power larger turboprop aircraft up to 1,000 nautical miles.

H2 View has contacted ZeroAvia for confirmation. The company did not respond by the time of publication.

The development comes after major setbacks in the wider hydrogen aviation space, which saw the collapse of ZeroAvia competitor Universal Hydrogen in 2024, and Airbus halt its commercial hydrogen aircraft plans.

Sceptics point to hydrogen’s high cost, low energy density, and infrastructure demands as major hurdles.

But ZeroAvia stands strong in its belief that its powertrains could deliver cost savings for airlines.

Chief Strategy Officer, James McMicking, told H2 View in 2025, that the firm has its first customers signing up.

“They are smaller players. The economics are pretty tight in aviation, so they’re really interested in the economic numbers that we can achieve, not just the environmental impact,” he said.

“That’s been one of the crucial parts of what we’ve done in trying to position the economics in the right sweet spot for some of these early adopters.”