FF was founded 1979 by Hanno Fischer based of his 30-years job experience as technical director of Rhein-Flugzeugbau GmbH (RFB), to implement his acquired knowledge in research, evolution and manufacturing of civil and military aircrafts, as well as military ground effect vehicles to business application.
Based on work by Dr. Lippisch Hanno Fischer together with his business partner Klaus Matjasic developed the first civil ground effect vehicles called Airfish.
The Airfoil Development GmbH (AFD) was founded 1997 by Klaus Matjasic and Hanno Fischer to evolve and produce, commissioned by an asian investor, an 8-seat ground effect vehicle by using the Airfish technology. In result of this project the AFD GmbH gets the official approval as the first worldwide producer in case of ground effect vehicles by the "Germanischer Lloyd". The AFD also gets the certification DIN ISO 9001 by the "Technischer Überwachungsverein" (TÜV) for deplopment and production of ground effect vehicles.
Based on decades of experience in research oft he ground effect by Fischer Flugmechanik and its realisation into commercial products done by AFD Airfoil Development GmbH, the German Government "Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung" (BMBF) in cooperation with the research institute for "Binnenschiffbau Duisburg" (VBD), pushed further continously the developing of the second generation of ground effect vehicles, the protected Hoverwing Technology. The technical demonstrator HW 2VT, which is working in this advanced and patent protected technology, is another milestone in respect of the scaling to major sizes up to 200 seats.