Tag: Jonathan Evans

Unmanned Aircraft Are Not the Wave of the Future — They Are the Present


Panelists: Moderator Glenn Roberts, chief engineer, Center for Advanced Aviation System Development, The MITRE Corp.; Jonathan Evans, co-president, Skyward; Jesse Kallman, president, Airbus Aerial; Van Espahbodi, co-founder and COO, Starburst Accelerator; Wes Ryan, manager, Programs & Procedures (Advanced Technology), Small Airplane Directorate, FAA

by Duane Hyland, AIAA Communications (2008-2017)

Evolving-Culture-of-Aviation-Panel-AVIATION2017
Participants in the panel discussion, “The Evolving Culture of Aviation,” June 6 at the 2017 AIAA AVIATION Forum in Denver.

Unmanned aircraft have exploded onto the aviation scene in recent years, and the industry needs to focus on the safety and security involved with these systems, a panel of experts said June 6 at the
2017 AIAA AVIATION Forum in Denver.

 

The
FAA predicts about 7 million total hobbyist and commercial drones will be purchased by 2020.

“All this change is happening at an incredibly rapid rate,” Glenn Roberts, chief engineer at the Center for Advanced Aviation Systems Development with
The MITRE Corp., told the audience in a session titled “The Evolving Culture of Aviation.”

Panelists explained the benefits of increased drone use, including eliminating human error from aviation; better monitoring of remote areas, such as power lines and rail lines; a greater collaboration between the information technology and aviation sectors; and a nearly limitless potential for creative future applications of the technology.

But, they said, there are challenges, including ensuring safe and successful integration of unmanned aircraft into the national airspace; educating the public about the safe nature of drones; and ensuring the systems are not put to nefarious uses.

Wes Ryan, manager of Programs & Procedures (Advanced Technology) with the
FAA’s Small Airplane Directorate, explained that safety is paramount, because if drones are put to “nefarious uses, nothing will kill quicker in the mind of the public.”

Jesse Kallman, president of
Airbus Aerial, echoed Ryan’s concern.

“It would only take a small incident to change the public’s perception,” Kallman said.

Panelists debated the role of humans when it comes to drone technology, settling on a scenario that would leave humans in the loop. As Jonathan Evans, co-president of
Skyward, explained, the human role would be “not in a cockpit, but sitting in a network control center.”

Van Espahbodi, co-founder and COO of
Starburst Accelerator, urged attendees to “find ways to participate in the UAS sector, especially as the tide rises.”

Video

All 2017 AIAA AVIATION Forum Videos

Inventors Hope Investors Give Them Room to Grow

Panelists: Moderator John Langford, chairman and CEO, Aurora Flight Sciences Corp.; Joe Burns, CEO, Sensurion Aerospace; Jonathan Evans, CEO, Skyward; Ben Marcus, co-founder and CEO, AirMap; Jason Rigoli, partner, Enlightenment Capital; Richard Whittle, author, “Predator: The Secret Origins of the Drone Revolution”

by David Hodes, Aerospace America contributing writer

Building the next generation of unmanned aerial systems requires educating investors and convincing them to make the leap into the industry, experts on the panel “Invention, Entrepreneurship and Unmanned Systems” said June 15 at the 2016 AIAA Demand for Unmanned Symposium in Washington, D.C.

Richard Whittle, author of the book “Predator: The Secret Origins of the Drone Revolution,” said drone development kicked into gear in the early part of the century as the Predator drone transitioned from a surveillance vehicle to an armed offensive weapon shooting Hellfire missiles during the hunt for Osama bin Laden.

Today, as the UAS industry hits its stride, investors are beginning to understand and court UAS businesses, said Jason Rigoli, partner at Enlightenment Capital, adding that trusting the intellectual capital inside of the industry is a big part of that growing confidence.

“The investing game is really about backing the jockey instead of the horse,” Rigoli said.

And the evolution of the UAS industry is happening fast.

“We as a business community are providing solutions ahead of problems,” said Jonathan Evans, CEO of Skyward. “There is a lot of work being done, and we need to keep giving developers the tools to do it. Democratized technology is in the hands of the end user, and we must evolve.”

Raising money is the next challenge, noted John Langford, chairman and CEO of Aurora Flight Sciences Corp. Fortunately, the unmanned space is now seeing more angel investors and other investment groups engaging with businesses, he said.

Rigoli agreed, adding, “But having a full ecosystem of development doesn’t mean capital is easy to access. It’s still hard to find an investor. When you do, it’s a marriage, and you’re stuck.”

Joe Burns, CEO of Sensurion Aerospace, said he is ready to take a meeting with every venture capitalist he can.

“We’re at a hockey-stick moment now, where you have to either make it big or have to cash out,” he said.

Burns said it’s important to focus on fundamentals — such as the business plan.

“You have to demonstrate to investors that you can sell the product,” he said.

In regards to whether small startup companies could expect to compete with Google, Facebook or Amazon, Evans said: “I think that those companies are sensitive to anti-trust issues. They seem to have the attitude of ‘Let’s let this startup eco system grow first.’”

 

All 2016 AIAA AVIATION Forum Videos

Drones Need More Room to Grow

Panelists: Moderator Dallas Brooks, director, Raspet Flight Research Laboratory, Mississippi State University, and co-chair, FAA’s UAS Science and Research Panel; John Cavolowsky, director, Airspace Operations and Safety Program, Aeronautics Research Mission Directorate, NASA headquarters; Jonathan Evans, CEO, Skyward; Diane Gibbens, president and CEO, Trumbull Unmanned; Charlie Keegan, chairman elect, Air Traffic Control Association; Michael Singer, CEO, DroneView Technologies

by David Hodes, Aerospace America contributing writer

The transformation of the country’s airspace to manage more traffic is well underway, and now is the time to give drones more areas to access to help develop standards, experts said June 16 at the 2016 AIAA Demand for Unmanned Symposium in Washington, D.C.

In the panel, “Transformation in the National Airspace System,” Jonathan Evans, CEO of Skyward, said the UAS industry wants to make the NAS safer in a technical, innovative and synergistic way.

“We can transform the national airspace by allowing drone operators to be in that space,” he said.

That begins with flight recordkeeping, which Evans says currently “is pretty dusty.”

“We can take the complexities of those records and can provide more elegant, simplified tools in a way that hasn’t been done before in aviation,” he said.

Mike Singer, CEO of DroneView Technologies, said his company collects data, stitches it together to form 3D models and creates maps of topography, providing tools to solve real problems about airspace usage.

“We are acting as a catalyst to bring this technology to the market,” he said.

Air traffic controllers also need to be involved in the discussion, said Charlie Keegan, chairman elect of the Air Traffic Control Association. He maintained they are the keepers of history and don’t want to repeat the mistakes of the past.

“We want to have a voice in how the airspace is managed,” Keegan said. “We want to say what it should be to give more understanding and clarity to the FAA studying it.”

Singer agreed, saying the FAA should be a reviewer of standards, not a generator.

UAS users are saturating the sky with their devices, Evans said, meaning that the transformation of the national airspace is happening on its own.

“It’s like the internet — it’s programmatic,” he explained, adding that the transformation of the airspace is about commercial demand of that airspace.

“Give us access,” Evans said. “We need to come into urban spaces. That is the evolution we need to help us go forward.”

All 2016 AIAA AVIATION Forum Videos