Tesla, Amazon Backer Baillie Gifford Invests $35M In Air Taxi Startup Lilium

Baillie Gifford has invested $35 million in Germany-based air-taxi startup Lilium, the Financial Times reported.

What Happened

The United Kingdom-based private investment firm holds a nearly 4% stake in Lilium as a result of the investment that valued the startup at more than $1 billion, according to the Financial Times.

Baillie Gifford is looking for "situations where there is the potential for a really transformative new market or product in the long term, while recognising that these will often take a lot of time to come to fruition," investment manager Michael Pye told the Financial Times.

The firm is best-known for being the largest external investor in electric vehicles maker Tesla Inc. TSLA and was also an early investor in Amazon.com Inc. AMZN, the Space Exploration Company (or SpaceX), Spotify Technology SA SPOT, and Airbnb Inc.

Baillie Gifford, earlier this year, invested in California-based Lilium rival Joby. Pye told the Financial Times that the firm's Lilium funding is higher than what it invested in Joby.

Lilium, which is aiming to launch five-seater city-to-city air taxis, has raised $375 million to date, according to the Financial Times.

Image Credit: Lilium.