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Keynote Speakers
Ondrej Kotaba, Honeywell
Ondrej Kotaba, Honeywell
Advancements and Challenges in Hybrid-Electric Aircraft Powertrains: Insights from the NEWBORN Project
This presentation will deliver an overview of recent advancements in hybrid-electric aircraft powertrain development. It will address various approaches to electrification, with particular attention to hierarchical system control methods, integration among multiple subsystems, and strategies for managing aircraft power, energy, and system efficiency. The discussion will identify critical challenges facing aircraft electrification, including weight limitations, thermal management concerns, battery technology constraints, differing approaches to ensure reliability between mechanical and electric systems, and high-voltage system resilience against partial discharge. Furthermore, the presentation will outline challenges associated with adopting hydrogen as the primary fuel source. Preliminary findings and insights gained from the NEWBORN project will be presented. A summary will provide recommendations for future research and identify remaining fundamental scientific gaps.
Short Bio:
Ondrej Kotaba is the Fellow at Honeywell Aerospace, responsible for sustainable aircraft propulsion technology. With over 20 years of industrial experience, he currently provides technical leadership to the Clean Aviation project NEWBORN. Ondrej has previously coordinated various research projects on aerospace high voltage systems, high reliability controls, and high power density electronics. His past contributions include work in signal processing, real-time multicore processing, and others. Ondrej’s alma mater is the Brno University of Technology. He is an author or multiple patents and a holder of private pilot license.
Dr. Ray Foley, Collins Aerospace
Dr. Ray Foley, Collins Aerospace
The presentation title will be updated soon.
Short Bio:
Ray Foley is Director, Multiphysics Systems at Collins Aerospace Applied Research & Technology (ART). ART has the mission to accelerate transformative technologies for a safer, more connected and sustainable world. In his role, Ray is responsible for progressing advanced system design and integration capabilities, including development of processes and methods to enable scaling and transition to the business units of Collins Aerospace. He is also Site Lead for the Collins Aerospace operation in Cork, Ireland.
Ray is an alumnus of University College Cork where, following his PhD degree, he worked as a lecturer in the Electrical Engineering department and undertook research on high density power electronics. He is the author/co-author of over 30 conference and journal publications. He has been a participant in several National and EU funded projects and is a board member of the EU Clean Aviation and SESAR joint undertaking programs
Christine Andrews, GE Aviation
Christine Andrews, GE Aviation
The presentation title will be updated soon.
Executive Hybrid Electric Systems Lead at GE Aviation
Executive Hybrid Electric Systems Lead at GE Aviation
Ludovic Ybanez, Airbus UpNext
Ludovic Ybanez, Airbus UpNext
The presentation title will be updated soon.
Short Bio:
After earning his electrical engineering degree in 2002, Ludovic Ybanez joined Safran, where he held several positions in the Design Office for turboshaft and avionics systems. He was then appointed head of the EWIS R&T department before being seconded to IRT Saint Exupery, a French research institute, as head of electrical power technologies for future electrical aircraft. In 2019, he joined Airbus’ central research & technology in Germany, then, in 2020, joined Airbus UpNext as head of the ASCEND demonstrator, focused on the potential and feasibility of cryogenic and superconducting technologies for aircraft electric propulsion. In addition, he is the Managing Director of Airbus Exo Zero Emissions SAS.
Dr. Andrew Woodworth, NASA Glenn Research Center
Dr. Andrew Woodworth, NASA Glenn Research Center
The presentation title and abstract will be updated soon.
Short Bio:
Dr. Andrew Woodworth is a lead technical advisor for NASA’s electrified aircraft technology development efforts and has specialized in closing technology gaps for megawatt and multi-megawatt powertrain systems. Currently, Andrew is in the Subsonic Vehicle Technologies and Tools (SVTT) project supporting transformational propulsion concepts. He has spent 16 years as a researcher in the Materials and Structures Division at NASA’s Glenn Research Center, leading efforts to develop new electric machine material approaches for electrified aircraft as well as researching and developing radiation-hardened silicon carbide-based power devices. Dr. Woodworth earned a Ph.D. in Physics from West Virginia University.
Invited Speakers
Dr. Tine Tomažič, Pipistrel Vertical Solutions
Dr. Tine Tomažič, Pipistrel Vertical Solutions
The presentation title, abstract, and short bio will be updated soon.
Dr. Tine Tomažič is the Director of Technology & Innovation at Pipistrel. He is an award-winning and globally recognized expert in the field of electric flight, with 20 years’ experience in aviation and 15 years’ experience in electric flight.
At Pipistrel, Tomažič was part of the team that developed the world's first two- and four-seat electric aircraft; the Taurus Electro and the Taurus G4. His work in systems automation and human machine interfaces ranges from autopilot technologies for unmanned aerial vehicles to electric and hybrid-electric propulsion systems. He holds EASA CVE and HDO privileges, is a member of SAE, EASA T4S Technology for Safety and received the 2016 AIAA Piper General Aviation Award as well as the 2021 AIAA Aircraft Design Award for Pipistrel’s Velis Electro, the world’s first certified electric aircraft.
Outside of Pipistrel, Tomažič is involved in the strategic road-mapping for manned and unmanned aviation, batteries, autonomy and emission-free flight and is a member of several research project advisory boards. This includes his current research in the field of certifiable hybrid-electric propulsion systems and their intuitive user interfaces. As well as being involved in its development, Tomažič is active in working groups with ASTM, SAE, and EUROCAE to rewrite current general aviation design standards, to allow proliferation of electric flight.
Tomažič holds a Bachelor of Science (B.Sc.) and a Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.) in electrical engineering from the University of Ljubljana, which he received in 2007 and 2014 respectively.
Dr. Johanna Dombrovskis, PowerCell
Dr. Johanna Dombrovskis, PowerCell
Performing, Scalable and Certifiable Fuel Cells in Aviation Today!
Short Bio:
Dr. Johanna K. Dombrovskis is Fuel Cell Stack Technology Manager at Swedish fuel cell manufacturer PowerCell Group, where she leads development, validation and integration of fuel cell stacks and components. With more than 15 years of experience in fuel cell stack and component development, she currently provides technical leadership to PowerCell’s contributions to the Clean Aviation project NEWBORN and other European and national research and innovation programs.
Prior to joining PowerCell over nine years ago, Johanna worked across academia and industry on fuel cell catalyst, electrode and stack R&D, building strong expertise in taking concepts from laboratory scale to robust products. She holds a PhD in Materials Science from Chalmers University of Technology (Sweden) and a Diplom Ingenieur degree from Technische Universität Darmstadt (Germany).
Prof. Tao Yang, University of Nottingham
Prof. Tao Yang, University of Nottingham
The presentation title, abstract, and short bio will be updated soon.
Prof. Tao Yang is a Full Professor in Power Electronics at the University of Nottingham and a recognized expert in electrified aircraft power systems. His work focuses on power electronics-dominated onboard electrical systems, including high-speed drives, microgrids, and digital twin technologies for more-electric, hybrid, and all-electric aviation. He has led major research initiatives in collaboration with leading aerospace companies such as Rolls-Royce, Safran, Dassault Aviation, GKN Aerospace, and Leonardo.
Yang completed his PhD in 2013, where he developed dynamic phasor modelling techniques for aircraft electrical systems—work that earned him the inaugural EU CleanSky Best PhD Award and was later incorporated into SAE AIR6326 standards. He has since played key roles in large EU-funded projects, including AEGART, focusing on advanced starter-generator systems.
He currently leads a team of PhD researchers and postdoctoral fellows and holds a Royal Academy of Engineering Industrial Fellowship. Prof. Yang is Chair of the IEEE Power Electronics Society Aerospace Power Technical Committee, an IET Fellow, IEEE Senior Member, and active contributor to international standardization and leading academic journals.
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