David Debney

David leads on overall aircraft technology assessments and analysis, including future aircraft concepts. He has responsibility for modelling capability, tools and methods to inform ATI’s technology strategy.

David’s experience in the aerospace sector spans technology, product development, certification and in-service support. He currently chairs the UK Jet Zero Taskforce Task and Finish Group for Hydrogen Aircraft, and previously chaired the Jet Zero Council Zero-Emission Aircraft Group. He also led the creation of the FlyZero project, working with industry and government stakeholders to launch the groundbreaking study. He was Chief Engineer for Aircraft Integration during the delivery phase of FlyZero and worked closely with the Project Director on overall strategy.

David represented the aerospace sector in the development of the UK’s Future Flight Challenge, covering novel aircraft, flight operations, unmanned air vehicle (UAV) and air traffic management (ATM) proposals.

Before joining the ATI, David worked at Rolls-Royce as Chief of Future Aircraft Concepts, where he led the design of hybrid propulsion systems, boundary layer ingestion and eVTOL aircraft concepts. He also led work packages in multiple European Clean Sky projects. Before this, he led the development and testing programme for the XWB-84 and XWB-97 products and has extensive experience in the certification, design validation and testing of gas turbines.

David is a Chartered Engineer, a Fellow of the Royal Aeronautical Society and holds an MEng in Aeronautics from Durham University.