Fokker Next Gen Latvia: What Was Promised, What Happened, and Why the Project Quietly Ended
News trigger: Latvia’s much-publicised hydrogen aircraft project is being liquidated
On 1 December 2025, the Latvian Business Register recorded the start of liquidation proceedings for SIA “Fokker Next Gen Latvia” — the company that, since early 2024, had been promoted as the future producer of Europe’s first liquid-hydrogen passenger aircraft.
The project generated significant attention in 2023–2024:
plans for a 120–150-seat hydrogen aircraft,
a proposed manufacturing line in Liepāja,
cooperation with RTU,
up to 100 new jobs,
a government memorandum,
and months of positive media coverage positioning it as a major innovation breakthrough for Latvia.
By late 2025, instead of aircraft assembly or engineering hires, the only development was the liquidation notice.
This raised the obvious question: what actually happened?
What Latvia was told to expect
According to LIAA materials, government statements and Fokker’s own communications (2023–2024), the project was framed as a major strategic investment:
a next-generation hydrogen aircraft with 120–150 seats,
a flight range of up to 2,500 km,
up to 100 new jobs in the first three years,
academic cooperation with RTU,
production and maintenance facilities in Liepāja,
and, in later media reports, even long-term potential for up to 800 jobs.
For Latvia, this was marketed as an entry into the green aviation industry — a rare opportunity for a region without an aerospace manufacturing base.
What the Latvian company really looked like
Public records (Firmas.lv) for Fokker Next Gen Latvia show a very different picture:
registered 16 February 2024,
share capital: €2,800,
employees: 1,
revenue: 0,
fixed assets: €3,944,
administrative expenses: ~€135,000.
These expenses were not operational losses — the company conducted no activity.
They were typical startup administrative costs (legal services, accounting, consultancy, internal project preparation), most of which likely flowed back to the Dutch parent through intra-group invoicing.
In other words, the Latvian entity was a project vehicle, not a factory.
Meanwhile in the Netherlands: the real project direction emerged
While Latvia was presenting the project as a future industrial anchor, developments in the Netherlands showed where Fokker’s actual priorities lay.
Groningen MoU (30 September 2024)
Fokker Next Gen signed a memorandum with the Northern Netherlands (Groningen Airport Eelde, regional authorities, educational and hydrogen infrastructure partners).
The document outlined:
a possible headquarters location,
a final assembly line (FAL) for the hydrogen aircraft,
integration with the Netherlands’ hydrogen ecosystem,
training pipelines and R&D clusters.
Latvia still appeared in this narrative — but now only as a “production line” somewhere in the wider hydrogen value chain, not the central site.
Partnership with ASL Aviation
Testing, certification and development activities gravitated toward the NL/BE aerospace environment.
By 2025, Latvia vanished from Fokker’s public communications
No news of engineers hired, no land secured in Liepāja, no procurement, no infrastructure preparation.
All visible momentum shifted toward the Dutch cluster.
Why the Latvian project never started
Several structural factors made the advertised plan unrealistic:
1) Latvia lacks an aerospace manufacturing ecosystem
No certification bodies, no hydrogen aircraft testbeds, no specialist suppliers, no engineering schools in this field.
Building a large commercial aircraft in such an environment was never viable.
2) Latvia helped Fokker strengthen its EU funding profile
In EU programmes like Clean Aviation and Horizon Europe, cross-border presence and cohesion-state participation increase project evaluation scores.
A Latvian SPV offered:
geographic expansion,
political endorsement,
positive PR in multiple Member States,
stronger optics for grant applications.( Continuation in Part 2 (next post))
Image: photos/photo_90@02-12-2025_20-31-55.jpg