The US ride-hailing app maker has said it expects flying vehicles to eventually become an affordable method of mass transportation.

Khosrowshahi was speaking at an investor forum in Tokyo on his first visit to Asia as Uber CEO. Ride-hailing firms such as Uber see populous Japan as a potentially lucrative market and are pressing regulators to ease stringent rules governing the taxi industry.

Uber has had a long time interest in flying taxis. Back in November, Uber had struck a deal with NASA to develop software for managing "flying taxi" routes in the air along the lines of ride-hailing services it has pioneered on the ground. Around the same time, the ride-hailing firm also announced that it will start its ambitious flying taxi project in Los Angeles in 2020 to deal with the city's traffic problem.