More than two decades after the Concorde took its final flight, a new era of supersonic travel is taking shape. At the center of this effort is Blake Scholl, founder and CEO of Boom Supersonic. Scholl, a former Amazon software engineer and self-taught aviation enthusiast, is driven by a simple but powerful idea: the dream of flying faster than sound has never really died.
In 2014, Scholl founded Boom Supersonic with a mission to build a passenger jet that could fly at Mach 1.7, reducing the travel time between New York and Paris to under four hours. Scholl believes that the technology has always been there, but the business models of the past were flawed. “The thinking has been, ‘Supersonic flight would obviously be great, but nobody is doing it so therefore it must be impossible.’ Not true,” he said in an interview.
The Vision for Supersonic Travel
Scholl imagines a future where travelers can fly across the ocean and back in a single day. He believes that, despite the setbacks that ended the Concorde’s run in 2003, people still want to travel faster. “We’re not working with new technology here,” he said, explaining that the real challenge is making supersonic flight affordable and sustainable.
Scholl sees Overture, Boom’s flagship aircraft, as the answer. This sleek jet will carry between 64 and 80 passengers and promises to cut trans-Atlantic flight times in half. The design is inspired by the Concorde’s needle-nosed look but uses carbon-fiber composites and advanced aerodynamics. Pilots will rely on external cameras and an augmented reality vision system, replacing traditional cockpit windows to improve visibility.
Progress and Setbacks
Boom has made significant progress, including building a smaller prototype called the XB-1, which recently became the first privately made American jet to break the sound barrier. During the January test flight at Mojave Air and Space Port in California, chief test pilot Tristan “Geppetto” Brandenburg pushed the XB-1 past Mach 1.1. “I’m not sure my brain’s fully caught up with me yet,” Brandenburg said afterward. “I think it might still be flying supersonic.”
The successful flight marked a historic step for Boom. “This afternoon we get to celebrate,” Scholl said after the flight. “Tomorrow, we’re back to work because it’s time to go big. It’s time to take this little airplane made out of airliner technology, and scale it up. Time to bring supersonic flight back.”
Overcoming Challenges
Even with these advances, Boom faces major hurdles. Delta CEO Ed Bastian has called Overture “a very, very expensive asset” and said that although he flew on the Concorde in the past, it was always through free upgrades, never by paying for a ticket. He explained, “I remember the Concorde as a cool experience, but I never saw the business model that would work for airlines today.”
Funding has been another challenge. Boom’s valuation fell from nearly $1 billion to around $500 million last year, and the company had to lay off half its staff. But Scholl remains confident. He said, “There’s this belief in the industry that to do these kinds of things requires billions of dollars, requires an army of people. And I sort of made the mistake of wanting to play into that.”
Former United Airlines CEO Oscar Munoz, who has invested in Boom, said he was impressed with how Scholl handled these challenges. “The funding thing was the scary thing that happened,” Munoz said. “The product itself, not scary.”
A Growing Team and Renewed Support
Boom’s backers include well-known investors like Elon Musk and Sam Altman of OpenAI, as well as former Boeing CEO Phil Condit. Condit said, “I think of this as a company that’s not just building a cheaper supersonic plane, but rather bringing a modern, Silicon Valley approach to disrupting aerospace in the way Tesla did in the automotive industry.”
The company’s headquarters are now in Denver, where a team of engineers is busy preparing for the next step: building the full-size Overture jet. Boom has already completed a “Superfactory” in Greensboro, North Carolina, where it plans to build 33 of these jets every year.
The Competition and the Future
Boom is not alone in the race to bring back supersonic travel. Other companies like Hermeus and Spike Aerospace are working on hypersonic and supersonic jets. NASA and Lockheed Martin are also developing a supersonic plane that will create a much quieter sonic boom, sometimes described as a “soft thump.”
Scholl is aware of the environmental concerns, especially since supersonic jets consume more fuel. But he believes that focusing on business-class seats will make it work financially. Boom plans to use sustainable aviation fuels and says that Overture will only fly supersonic over oceans, where noise is less of a concern.
Former Concorde pilot Mike Bannister, who watched the XB-1 test flight, said, “I’ve been waiting over 20 years for the return of supersonic speeds, and XB-1’s historic flight is a major landmark towards my dreams being realized.”
When Will Overture Fly?
Boom hopes to start flight tests with a full-size Overture prototype by 2027 and begin carrying passengers by the end of 2029. While some airlines have placed early orders, most of the funding will come when the planes are closer to delivery. Scholl has adjusted Boom’s fundraising target to $1 billion to $2 billion, saying that should be enough to get the project to the point where customer payments begin funding operations. So far, the company has raised about $600 million.
For Scholl, the mission is bigger than just building a plane. “As an American, I find it really scary to see the slow erosion of competence in the aerospace industry,” he said. “There is a very real possible future where most of the world’s passengers are flying around on Chinese jets, and the only way that doesn’t happen is if we invent and build the next generation of airplanes.”
Scholl’s vision is to make supersonic travel part of everyday life again, not just a relic of the past. With a prototype that has already broken the sound barrier and a team determined to keep pushing forward, the dream of flying faster than sound is closer than it has been in decades.
