Confession. Until yesterday, I had never heard of Electrifly-In Switzerland. 

It just turned ten. 

Three days at Bern Airport. Electric, hybrid, and hydrogen aircraft on the ramp. Trial flights for the public, pilots racing across borders on electric power. A national airline on stage. 

And I missed it. All of it. 

The Scene

Friday night, airport CEO Urs Ryf and Swiss National Councillor Matthias Juslin opened the doors. 

Then seven teams pitched. Milan Aircraft. AeroDelft. Smartflyer. CELLSIUS. Levitate Aerospace. Unicorn Aviation. And a crew electrifying a vintage Bücker Jungmann.

Bücker Jungmann - this, but electric!

Engineer Marc Corpataux made the call of the weekend. Every training aircraft in Switzerland goes electric by 2030. 

Unicorn Aviation walked away with the Innovation Award for its Flex-Fuel fuel injection. 

The Compounding

The event started in 2017 as the Smartflyer Challenge. 

One team. One hometown airport in Grenchen. 

The world’s first all-electric fly-in. 

Then it compounded. 

2020 - 16 electric aircraft. Bertrand Piccard signs on as patron.

2022 - Outgrows Grenchen. Moves to Bern.

2025 - Smartflyer signs H55 for batteries, on stage.

2026 - Tenth edition.

A handshake turns into hardware. H55’s batteries landed at Smartflyer in April. First flight is targeted for this fall. 

Why Europe

Earlier this month, I wrote that America is the outlier. Only 1% of North American airports are privately owned. 

Chart from previous post

Here’s what jumped out at me in Bern. 

The airport didn’t just host. It sponsored. 

Flughafen Bern AG signed on at the Megawatt level. The Canton of Bern and the City of Bern backed it through their economic development offices. SWISS put its name on it. So did Waterjet AG, Farizon Auto, and EnergyFarm AG.

That’s the whole stack. 

Airport. Airline. Government. Industry. One hangar. One objective. Electric flight. 

When an airport runs like a business, a new aircraft is a new customer. Bern rolled out the red carpet. 

The signs of life in electric aviation are likely to appear in places like this. Grenchen. Bern. Memmingen. 

We must keep our eyes overseas. And next September, I want to be in Bern. 

Godspeed.

PS - here’s a great video recap via Matt’s Aviation Channel. Enjoy!

Today I’m in Aspen for the Sister Cities’ Aspen Garmisch-Partenkirchen 60th Anniversary Summit.

The event welcomes delegates from both Aspen + Garmisch-Partenkirchen to celebrate its 60th year of friendship.

Sister Cities is unique because it connects two geographically and politically distinct localities for the purpose of promoting cultural and commercial relations.

Today, conversations covered the two cities’ unique history, how they manage tourism, and how sports impact the health of a community.

And I was thrilled to hear comments regarding the common problem of traffic congestion.

This is why I’m digging into this organization.

As I think about the problems with transportation, it’s evident they can be very local issues. Landscape, demographics, density, tourism, access to recreation - all of these variables influence the interworkings of transportation systems.

And here’s a great example: Queenstown, New Zealand - one of Aspen’s sister cities - is building an aerial tram to tackle its ever-growing traffic issues.

The developer recently announced it raised $150M to push the project forward. I’ll be sure to keep an eye on the Queenstown Cable Car project.

I even heard a rumor that an architect in Aspen developed an aerial tram system in the 80s, but failed to gain community support.

And technically, an aerial tram is a flying car - it just has a cord ;)

Things are happening.

Slowly, then all at once.

But before you go, I encourage you to check out Sister Cities International! You never know what community your hometown is connected to!!

Last month, Hylio was No. 2 on my list of fastest-accelerating manufacturers in the FAA registry. Right behind Zipline.

So I went digging.

Hylio makes agricultural spray drones out of Texas.

Big ones.

And since I started collecting the registry on March 20, they’ve spread like Aspen trees.

On March 20, there were 798 Hylio aircraft registered in the US.

Today there are 1,179.

+381 new drones in 6 months. +48%.

Nearly all of the growth comes from two drones.

The HYL-150, Ares, hauls 110lbs of liquid and can cover up to 120 acres an hour. The HYL-300, Atlas, is rated for a 250-pound payload.

Fun backstory. Hylio started in a dorm room at the University of Texas at Austin in 2015. Today, its plant outside Houston can build 5,000 drones a year.

In December, the FCC blocked new foreign-made drones from getting approved for sale in the States.

In August, it proposed going further, specifically covering foreign spray drones and anything over 55 pounds.

Hylio is protected. It builds in Texas, and says 80% of its components come from the US or allied countries.

This is the Aerial Economy in action. Slowly, then all at once. Message me if you'd like to see more data.

One footnote - the FAA registry only tracks drones > 55lbs. Hylio’s smaller models are untraceable.

The first step in the Aerial Economy is autonomy.

On the ground, Tesla, Waymo, Zoox, and Avride fight for the robotaxi market.

In the air, Joby just made history.

Last week, a Joby-equipped Cessna Caravan flew coast to coast. California to North Carolina. 3,199 miles. Zero control inputs from the safety pilot on board.

The aircraft (flying robot) controlled everything. Taxi. Takeoff. Cruise. Landing. Humans just watched from the ground.

Pilotless passenger flight is still years away. Maybe decades. But the direction is set. Momentum will fly us forward.

Freight will go first. Cheaper, faster deliveries.

Remote towns will be less restricted by roads.

Eventually, flying cars will arrive.

Slowly, then all at once.

Want to learn more about autonomous aerial logistics?

Poseidon Aerospace co-founder David Zagaynov joined the Relentless podcast to talk about unmanned cargo planes.

The company recently raised a $60M Series A. Take note - Wall Street is waking up.

More notes on where the Aerial Economy is headed.

My favorite guide is the telecom industry. 

It just fits.

It took 107 years to get from Bell's telephone patent to the first commercial cell call.

For most of that century, the phone was bolted to a wall. 

It rang a place, not a person.

Then came the cell phone.

Aviation is on the same path. It's leaving the wall.

This week, Zipline entered talks to raise about $1 billion at a valuation near $20 billion.

That's nearly 3x its January mark.

A month ago, it partnered with Uber. The target is one million drone deliveries a day by the end of 2029.

What's happening in transportation and logistics is the most exciting story in the world.

Forget the AI. Forget the politics. Forget the wars and the endless grift. Forget football.

We are living at the dawn of a new era in transportation.

It's the closest thing to teleportation we've ever seen.

The Same Stack

Every network gets built the same way. Rules at the bottom. Customers on top.

Aviation already has a name in almost every row. Devices. Carriers. Chargers. Traffic control.

One row is still open. The site.

In telecom, that row became American Tower.

The S-Curve

Cell phones didn't take off. They crawled.

In 1985, there were 340,213 wireless subscribers. Ten years later, 33.8 million, ~13% of the country.

Then the curve went vertical. By 2010, there were 96 phones for every 100 Americans.

For reference, the iPhone dropped in 2007. Cell phones matured to the “early majority” stage before Steve + co took over.

And behind every point on that line is steel. 913 cell sites in 1985. 447,605 in 2024.

Subscribers to Deliveries

Telecom tracks subscribers. Aviation // logistics logs deliveries.

In April 2024, Zipline made a delivery every 70 seconds. Today, every 20.

The 2029 target works out to about 11 per second.

Those two short bars are akin to telecom in 1985. It’s so early.

And my FAA registry data says the same thing. Delivery drones on the FAA registry grew 69% in five months. 

Build the Tower

Zipline is Ma Bell. It builds the aircraft, the docks, and the routes, because nothing exists to plug into yet.

Networks don't stay that way. Carriers sold their towers. Tower companies bought them. The tenancy layer won.

In case you missed it - Zipline founder Keller Rinaudo Cliffton sat down with the Relentless podcast to talk about the company’s growth. 

It’s a must-listen. 

Here’s the money quote,

Technologies have to be scaling in a way that makes neighborhoods more beautiful, quieter, safer, with less pollution and less traffic.

So, where's my flying car? It's coming.

Godspeed.

Today I visited my friend Barry Stout at his 1,000-acre ranch outside of Newcastle, Colorado. 

I met Barry through the Devereux Polo Cup he hosts at Stout Ranch every spring. 

The visit was twofold - I want land, livestock, horses - but it should be self-sustaining. Cash flow positive. 

Barry has learned this skill over decades of ranching and playing professional polo. I can learn a lot through sweat + osmosis. 

I also think about how drones can serve a property like this.

One man - 0 ranch hands - 1,000 acres to care for. 

Barry is the best - but he can’t know everything and be everywhere at once. 

I’d love to provide him and other large landowners with “eyes in the sky.”

Folks - we’re operating in the Wild West.

And private landowners may be the path of least resistance at this stage of the Aerial Economy. 

I’ve found too much bureaucracy with the federally owned airports for us to disrupt the industry responsibly. 

Zig when they zag. 

Perhaps the Aerial Economy is most likely to flourish in places we least expect. A private ranch. The golf course. The “flyover states” VCs love to ignore. 

I understand the hoopla about aviation innovation in military + defense. 

To each their own.

But this is what gets me Rile’d up. Solving problems without creating new ones.

Enjoy a few photos from the Ranch. No pony shots. I was in the zone :)

Ski Stout - a private ski experience

Godspeed.

Learn more about Stout Ranch here. And here’s a direct link for more info on Polo.

Before we dive in, Tesla set October 1 for the Roadster unveil. Nine years late, but who's counting…

The teaser shows four thruster plumes. Those are the SpaceX cold-gas thrusters Musk has been promising, and he said the package could lift the car off the road. Briefly.

We'll take it.

Are You Ready For Part 108?

The Aerial Economy is shifting.

Today, every commercial drone operator flies under Part 107. It's a license for the sky, with four stipulations.

• Maintain visual line of sight

• Aircraft weighs less than 55 lbs

• Stay below 400 feet

• Avoid airports

The first one is key.

It requires a human to keep eyes on the aircraft at all times. Unaided. Glasses are fine. Binoculars are not. A camera feed is not.

Here's what most people get wrong. Autonomous flight is perfectly legal. A drone can fly an entire mission by itself right now, today, under Part 107.

It just can't fly beyond visual line of sight.

That is the leash. Not the software. Not the hardware. A pair of human eyes standing in a field.

Three of those four rules can be waived. You apply to the FAA for one flight, in one location, and it expires. Weight is the only one you can't waive.

Which means the ceiling on this entire industry isn't battery life or autonomy or cost.

It's a filing cabinet in Washington. The FAA knows it. Enter Part 108.

What Is Part 108?

Part 108 was first proposed on August 7, 2025.

It's a new operating framework built specifically for routine beyond visual line of sight flight. BVLOS.

This isn't a waiver. It's not an exemption.

Part 108 is a parallel rulebook that sits alongside Part 107. Part 107 governs a pilot. Part 108 governs an operation.

Here's what shifts.

Two doors. A lighter permit path for simple work over open country. A full operating certificate for everything else, which requires a safety management system, a training program, maintenance records, TSA vetting, and duty and rest limits.

Weight jumps to 1,320 pounds. Tiers at 55, 110, and 1,320. For reference, a Robinson R22 helicopter weighs 1,370. These drones are toys no more... 

Risk gets measured by who's underneath you. The FAA carved the country into five population density levels. Level 1 is empty ranchland. Level 5 is downtown. The permit path stops at Level 3.

Approval covers an area, not a flight. An operational area replaces the per-flight waiver. Prove the system once, then operate inside the volume.

The organization carries the liability, not the pilot. Two new roles show up. Operations Supervisor and Flight Coordinator. Neither one is chained to a single airframe.

Manufacturers declare airworthiness. No type certificate. That's what lets hardware move at software speed.

And the fight. Below 400 feet, a properly equipped Part 108 drone would hold right of way over crewed aircraft that aren't broadcasting their position. More than half of the roughly 3,100 comments hit that one provision. The FAA reopened the docket to gather additional feedback.

What Doesn't Change

Part 107 isn't going anywhere.

Fly your own drone, keep it in sight; nothing changes in your life.

Part 107 is a driver's license. Part 108 is a CDL. 

Both still exist. They're designed for different jobs.

What Gets Built

Here's the part worth sitting with.

Part 108 removes the required human attention per flight.

Right now every flight costs you a person standing in a field. Approve an area instead, staff a supervisor, and the next flight costs about what it costs to charge your phone.

When something goes from expensive to essentially 0, people don't buy more of it. They create things that were never possible. 

Here are a few that come to mind, 

Frequency is the product. A bridge gets inspected every two years. A power line gets a helicopter twice a year at helicopter rates. Nobody offers daily intelligence, because until now nobody could. This is a budget item in America. 

A radius replaces a truck. Every business that answers a call by sending a vehicle becomes a candidate for an aerial alternative. 

Two new career paths. Operations Supervisor. Flight Coordinator. 

Approved sky starts to look like property. An operational area is a right to fly a defined volume of air. Rights like that get claimed once. This is a gold rush.

Nobody knows what will pose as a viable business. But that’s the fun part. Put on your thinking caps… 

Where It Stands

The final rule hit the White House budget office on July 10, 2026. Review runs 90 days. Day 90 lands October 8.

Nobody knows the exact approval date. 

But we do know this… Whatever gets built, it launches from somewhere. Real dirt, real power, real permits.

That part doesn't wait on Washington, and it takes longer than Washington will.

The people who win in this new sandbox aren't the ones with the best idea. They're the ones who moved before the starting gun.

Godspeed,

Riley

Another blue bird day in the Aerial Economy.

A few months back, Nicolas Zart shared with me a statistic that I’m still trying to understand.

America is the outlier in how we own and operate our aviation infrastructure.

The following chart shows the distribution of private participation in airport ownership.

North America checks in at 1% privately owned.

The irony is a comedy.

The next generation of aviation is likely to require an uptick in private participation.

Why?

Government agencies are not the most efficient systems. We need private funding, the entrepreneurial spirit, and the audacity to create change.

Last night on my drive down Valley, I listened to a podcast on this very topic.

#79 Bob Poole, Reason Foundation: The pros and cons of privatizing airports

The Vertical Space · Episode

Spotify

Bob Poole parses through the pros and cons of privatization. It’s a must-listen.

And to me - the pros of privatization outweigh the cons. Better rates, more flights, enhanced user experience. It’s not even close.

However, the US Gov is unlikely to relinquish its monopolistic control over our teleportation system.

We love the FAA, but there has to be a better way.

If we’re going to push through the next frontier, aviation may need private motivation.

I’m working through an aerial application for large landowners in the US.

If you build it, they will come.

Message me if you’d like to hear more about how I’m putting the pieces together.

The aviation industry is flying at light speed.

This morning I combed through the FAA’s latest announcements.

Here are a few that caught my eye,

Transportation Secretary Sean P. Duffy Invests $481 Million Ahead of Labor Day Weekend to Improve Airport Infrastructure Across U.S.

• FY26 Airport Infrastructure Grant Funding Amounts (Interactive Map)

FAA Announces Key Demonstrations with the First Remotely-Piloted Hybrid-Electric Flight for Cargo Shipment

• Built to move heavy cargo autonomously in the places that need it most, including offshore energy platforms, industrial supply chains, disaster response, and communities beyond the reach of traditional infrastructure.

Transportation Secretary Sean P. Duffy Announces Major Expansion of FAA BEYOND Program to Advance Drone Innovation

• “As drone technology continues to advance, the FAA is focused on building a regulatory framework that is safe, scalable, and grounded in real-world data.
  
  Phase 2 of BEYOND will expand the partnerships and operations needed to address remaining challenges in beyond visual line of sight operations, public safety missions, on-airport operations and other complex airspace environments.” (via FAA Administrator Bryan Bedford)

FAA Announces Key Demonstrations with Hybrid-Electric Flights Connecting Small Airports to Major Airports

• Information collected will help build a system that connects Americans in rural communities and larger metropolitan areas, creating more opportunities for jobs and essential services.

FAA Marks Major Milestone with Hybrid-Electric Flight Test in Utah

• Utah brings together industry, government, and research partners to collect data so the FAA may safely evaluate emerging aviation technologies that have the potential to strengthen regional connectivity, expand economic opportunity, and improve mobility for communities across our state and the nation.”

I also found this super cool map that indicates Approved BVLOS Waivers for Possible DFR Programs.

Find your hometown - see what aviation innovation is coming to your neighborhood :)

All for today.

Happy Labor Day!

Want to share something I've been thinking about throughout the week: Drone Infrastructure as a Service.

As I think through the Aerial Economy, I'm imagining the application layer.

We're seeing a few unique use cases for drones + aerial technologies, but we're not even in the first inning of this trend.

It's so early.

How I Think About This

Software as a service did not win because of monthly billing.

It won because one instance served thousands of customers at once. Build it once, serve the next customer for almost nothing. Median software gross margin held at 80% in 2025 across 342 companies, per the Aleph and Benchmarkit benchmarks.

Multi-tenancy was the innovation. Subscription pricing was the receipt.

Then robots as a service copied the playbook.

Why This Could Work

In December 2024, Serve Robotics announced it could self-fund equipment investments, eliminating the near-term need for equipment financing.

Read that twice. Funding a depreciating fleet with equity, announced as a win.

Shares went from roughly 51.5 million at the end of 2024 to about 67.8 million by the third quarter of 2025. Today, roughly 2,000 robots across 44 cities, with 2026 revenue guidance near $26 million.

About $13,000 per robot per year. My math, not theirs.

One robot. One delivery. One customer at a time. The marginal cost of the next customer is another robot.

That is not software. That is leasing.

Here is where drones play their part.

A robot is a thing. A node is a place.

Fire district in the morning. Utility inspection at midday. Insurance carrier flying hail claims in the afternoon. Rancher checking stock water at dusk.

None of them can justify the node alone. Together, underwriting is easy.

The demand is growing - exponentially. 

Over 1,000 public safety agencies held the FAA Part 91 waivers needed for a Drone as First Responder program as of February 2026. Only 976 had been granted from 2018 through April 2025.

Permission and regulation stopped being the bottleneck. 

It's capital.

A docked Drone First Responder program runs $25,000 and climbs beyond $60,000. 

There are thousands of agencies with a hunting license and no rifle. 

Why This May Be A Capital-Efficient Path Forward

Cell towers are the model.

One tenant returns about 3%. Nobody finances 3%. Add a second and a third, operating costs barely move, no new capital goes in, and the tower sells for 30 to 40 times cash flow.

Same steel. More tenants. 

American Tower does not manufacture towers. Somebody welds steel at a manufacturing margin. Somebody else owns the site and collects the rent.

Two businesses. Two multiples.

This is the layer I want. 

Now the challenging part - a carrier’s antenna is passive. 

Four carriers share a tower with zero contention. 

A drone can only be in one place at a time. 

So multi-tenancy has to come from capacity, not scheduling. More bays. More aircraft. 

I don’t have a clear read on that yet. 

Maybe it's a mobile drone factory. Maybe it's something else. Time will tell. 

What Makes The Node Attractive Today

Most drones today fly under Part 107. The aircraft stays within sight of a human. Beyond that, you need a waiver, one at a time.

Part 108 replaces that. A standing rule for beyond visual line of sight, up to 1,320 pounds, with operating area approvals instead of per-flight paperwork.

Here’s why it matters to a node. 

With visual line of sight, the droneport is a garage. 

Beyond visual line of sight, the node serves a radius. It becomes a hub. 

Part 108 reached OIRA on July 10, 2026. Review can run 90 days. Energizing a site takes about 18 months. Construction is 4 to 8 weeks. The rest is permits and the utility queue. 

If we start now, the waiting is free.

If we wait for the rule, start the day everyone else does, we’re late.

Having fun yet? 

I texted my manufacturing partner about the concept. His response:

"What prompted this thought?"

A few days later:

"The droneport as a service model is pretty bonkers. You're properly onto something!!"

I’m still flying blind, building in uncharted waters. But how does that saying go… 

If you build it, they will come.

Today is the day.

Tesla will host its Cybercab launch event at 3:45 PM MT. It’s exclusive. Invite only. 

Monday, the stock ripped +5.51%. Today it’s carried another +7%. 

Tesla daily

Since its low close on July 29, $TSLA is up nearly 30%. 

Performance since July 29, 2026

It’s impossible to fully understand the ripple effects autonomous driving and robotaxis will unlock. But the market sees the shift.

Imagine, just for a second, if the stress of your morning commute were erased. Poof - like magic.

Back to reality… 

Looking at Tesla - the stock - we see tremendous pent-up energy. 

It’s traded sideways since early 2021.

We can think of this price action as similar to a spring - coiling, compressing, before an explosive expansion.

This may be the most entertaining stock to watch into year-end. 

Slowly, then all at once. 

Godspeed.

As some of you recall, I started collecting the FAA flight registry data on March 20th.

I leveraged Claude to craft a terminal prompt that downloads the publicly available registry.

The registry is a real-time document. I couldn't find anyone with historical figures. So I captured it myself.

This is Marble Institute of Technology's proprietary data. How neat is that? :)

Looking back, there are a few noteworthy findings in August.

The delivery drone category grew 17% month-over-month.

Zipline itself increased 18% month-over-month. (Read about Uber x Zipline's latest partnership here.) This jump for Zipline is its fastest acceleration recorded - something for us to watch moving forward.

Agriculture drones advanced 4% month-over-month.

And Seneca secured valid certificates for 47 tail numbers. The wildfire-fighting drone company announced a 5-year partnership with the Aspen Fire Protection District back in February.

I should note that the 47 tail numbers were previously recorded in the registry, but the change in status reflects the aircraft crossing from reserved to registered, the last administrative step before they can operate. Way to go, Seneca!

Passenger eVTOLs were unchanged. The air taxi industry is moving at a glacial pace.

The fastest-accelerating manufacturers include:

1. Zipline

2. Hylio

3. Amazon.com

4. Amor Fati (Seneca)

5. Van's Aircraft

6. Maule

7. Robinson Helicopter

8. Taylorcraft

9. Cameron Balloons

10. Daher Aircraft

It's early days in the Aerial Economy, but something's afoot.

The momentum in delivery drones is accelerating.

Slowly, then all at once.

Message me if you'd like the full markdown file. It's technical, but fun to watch the trends take shape.

It's a big week for next-gen transportation tech.

Tesla officially launches the Cybercab at an exclusive event in Austin, Texas, on September 3.

The event is nothing more than a press conference.

Elon and co have learned to mirror the beloved keynotes made famous by Steve Jobs.

For anyone new to this: the Cybercab is a two-seat electric car with no steering wheel and no pedals.

There is nothing to drive.

You get in, and it takes you where you're going.

We've said it before: the first step in the Aerial Economy is autonomy.

Autonomous driving is the biggest shift in transportation technology since the stagecoach.

The stagecoach was the first time an ordinary person could buy a seat instead of owning a horse.

The Cybercab is that same trade, two hundred years later, without the driver.

Why Is This Such A Big Unlock?

Start with the part nobody wants to talk about.

36,640 people died on American roads last year.

The overwhelming majority of those crashes trace back to a human being making a mistake.

Now look at the machines.

Waymo has driven 220.6 million miles with nobody in the driver's seat.

Over that distance, its vehicles were involved in 92 percent fewer crashes causing pedestrian injuries than human drivers.

That's Waymo's own number, so take it with a grain of salt.

The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety ran the data independently this year and found 81 percent fewer injury crashes overall.

I'm a data-driven guy.

If the numbers hold, autonomy shouldn't be an option. It should be the standard.

Then There’s The Money

The real-world financial ripple effects of what Cybercab unlocks are undeniable.

The company's goal is twenty cents per mile. Fully considered. Energy, maintenance, cleaning, insurance, depreciation.

AAA puts personal vehicle ownership at seventy-seven cents per mile. Uber and Lyft run a dollar to four.

Imagine you're a youngster starting out in America.

The cost of breathing is rising exponentially, and you need a reliable vehicle to get to work.

Twenty cents a mile changes that math.

Sure - not everyone is a customer of the Cybercab.

But I suspect the individuals who receive the greatest benefit are the ones who need the most assistance.

We're just going to have to get used to sharing.

A foreign concept for many of us.

But what's fascinating is that this concept of shared mobility thrives in the aviation community.

Pilots, like most folks, feel the pain of rising costs.

To combat this, they connect. They create partnerships and offload a percentage of the cost of ownership.

There's much to learn from the aviation community.

Tesla's driverless fleet went from a handful of cars to roughly 186 in about fourteen months.

None of those are Cybercabs. Not yet. They're modified Model Ys.

But look at the slope of that curve.

Active unsupervised Tesla vehicles seen in the last 90 days. Source: [tracker name]. Figures are estimates.

I understand the desire to own our "own" means of transportation.

But is it more important to own the thing that moves us?

Or is it more important to actually just move?

ICYMI: Listen to the latest episode of Founders + Friends on how drones are transforming emergency response!

Something is happening with drones as first responders, and almost nobody outside public safety is talking about it.

Let’s look at the adoption curve. The FAA granted 976 waivers for drone-as-first-responder operations in the seven years following the program's launch in 2018. In the ten months that followed, it cleared more than a thousand additional agencies.

One year cleared seven years’ worth of growth.

Slowly… then all at once.

Chula Vista started the first program in the country. As of May, they had flown 25,000 missions. On 17,170 of those calls, the drone arrived before any ground unit. Average time on scene: ~96 seconds.

On 4,629 calls, no patrol officer had to respond at all. The drone got there, looked, and confirmed there was nothing to send anyone to.

Roughly one call in five returned to the department.

Think about the ripple effects.

Every city in this country is short on responders and tight on money. Drones are a tool that puts eyes on a scene in a minute and a half and gives you back a fifth of your call volume.

Drones are not replacing first responders - they multiply.

Sweden is an example to follow.

On July 19th, an Everdrone aircraft in Borås launched on a suspected cardiac arrest and lowered an AED by winch. It beat the ambulance. A bystander applied the pads under dispatcher direction and delivered the shock. The patient, a man in his sixties, got his pulse back at the scene. Swedish public radio reported the aircraft was deployed 15 seconds after the alert.

15 seconds from alarm to air.

Last week, I spoke with David Bigelow. A man deploying this technology in real time.

David has served for more than 20 years in his local fire and EMS departments. He’s a commercial pilot, flight instructor, and flies missions for a multi-agency program in Chesterfield County, Virginia, that went live in July. Police, fire and EMS, the sheriff’s office, and the 911 call center are all sharing the same drones, docks, and pilots.

Every flight his team makes is public record. The pilot still checks the weather and airspace before launch. David welcomes the skeptics and pulls up the transparency dashboard for them.

Bigelow shares how drones went from mainstream to infrastructure. It stopped being a gadget somebody demos at a conference and became something a community can buy, mount, and deploy.

The tech is proven. Regulators are playing catch-up.

Catch my conversation with David, then ask your fire chief if they deploy drones as first response. I’m curious to hear what they say.

Over the weekend, I connected with Ryan Chamberlain, the lead drone operator for Colorado’s North Fork Valley. Will share details as things develop.

In the meantime, watch our latest conversation below, or listen on the go. 

David - thank you for joining us on Founders + Friends! The door is always open :)

Last week was a fast week.

A few trips to the Western Slope. Grand Junction, Montrose, Delta. Then two nights at the Marble Airfield for the RAF work party. I saw airplanes being made. Metal bent, formed, cast into shape. Built relationships with pilots from across the State and slept under the stars alongside the banks of the Crystal River.

Let's dive in.

Following last week's introduction at the Grand Junction Regional Airport board meeting, I toured Spirit Engineering's manufacturing facility.

Aircraft engineer Lafe Wood warmly greeted me. Another gentleman joined us; Larry had just secured a serial number for the SE-1, Spirit's single-seat aircraft.

It was awesome to see manufacturing in action. People on the assembly line. Large industrial-grade equipment. American ingenuity at its finest.

The Weekend

I went to Marble. One of my favorite places on Earth. Volunteered at the Recreational Aviation Foundation's first annual work party.

Roughly ten planes flew in. Folks from all over the state.

Corporate jet pilots. Semiconductor engineers. Military veterans. It was a wonderful group.

We cleaned up the airfield. Thinned the sprouting willows encroaching on the runway.

Removed a tree that was out of place.

And enjoyed family meals at the only spot in town.

I also witnessed a plane crash - first for me.

The pilot, the only man on board, was able to walk to the ambulance with some assistance.

It was a terrible accident that ended in the best way possible.

No serious injuries. No spark. No fire.

It's not often we find ourselves in potentially catastrophic situations.

But the way the group came together, without hesitation, to get him out of the aircraft and to safety was a moment I will cherish forever.

I share this because we need to understand the risks we're dealing with.

I'm not talking about numbers on a screen. I'm talking about when a massive hunk of metal crumples like a paper airplane.

Grateful for the opportunity to join this group.

Thank you, Sue, Ken, the RAF, the town of Marble, Slow Groovin' BBQ, and the Walton family for being such wonderful hosts.

Godspeed.

P.S. I’m looking to connect with seasoned commercial RE developers.
Please message me if this is you!

Tuesday, I sat in on the Grand Junction Regional Airport board meeting. 

I’m incredibly grateful for the transparency and public access of these meetings.

Much of the material is boring, but it’s great to connect with the individuals responsible for decisions that affect our transportation network. 

As someone who learns best by osmosis, airport board meetings are among the highest-leverage opportunities for me in 2026. 

I’m learning a lot. I’m in the right rooms, and flying cars are becoming a topic of conversation. 

Slowly, then all at once. 

I met with several board members and airport staff. 

The airport’s CEO, Angela Padalecki, and I learned that we share the same hometown. Small world. Angela also serves as Chair for CDOT’s Aeronautical Board. Great person to know!

The meeting focused on the approval of several grants for improvement projects, including a runway expansion, new signage, and the installation of a dinosaur! :)

Like most industry events, the real action is never the event // meeting itself. But rather the sequence before + after. 

The meet-and-greets that create meaningful relationships. The side-quests as the main quest. 

I was introduced to Spirit Engineering, a Special Light Sport Aircraft manufacturer based in Grand Junction, Colorado. I’d never heard of Spirit and am excited to learn more. 

Rumor has it, the aircraft sells for less than $70,000. A potential game-changer in personal aviation.

Today, I’m visiting Spirit for a tour of their manufacturing facility. 

Godspeed.

Uber and Zipline announced a partnership yesterday. Drone delivery on Uber Eats. First deployments later this year. And Uber is investing in Zipline.

The partnership target: 1M drone deliveries per day by the end of 2029.

Zipline makes a delivery every 20 seconds today. That’s 4,320 a day.

1M a day is 231x that in about 40 months.

That is the most aggressive growth target I’ve seen anyone put in writing. We love to see it.

Keller Cliffton, Zipline founder and CEO, said the thing that matters. This partnership would not have been possible a year ago. It’s possible today because the technology is ready to scale.

“Teleportation isn’t science fiction anymore. It’s becoming part of everyday life.”

Keller Cliffton, Zipline Founder and CEO

Zipline flew 135M autonomous commercial miles to get here. Five thousand hospitals. Thousands of lives saved every year. Ten years of the real world kicking them around until the aircraft worked, the routes worked, and the regulators said yes.

Five years ago, Zipline was a pilot program in Rwanda. Today it’s targeting 231x growth in the next 40 months.

No wonder Zipline dominates the new additions to the FAA flight registry. 

Check out the partnerships press clip below.

Comments, questions, inquiries? Message me.

Fun one today.

Last week, I spoke with Vight founder Tsung Xu. 

Tsung left Uber during the pandemic and taught himself to code.

Then he decided software was not enough.

He wanted something he could work on for 30 years.

So he learned hardware the hard way. An autonomous quadcopter in his garage. Then two VTOLs built from scratch, three months each. He had never built anything that flew on a wing. He crashed a lot. He posted all of it.

The second launch video went viral.

Then he started Vight.

He built the thing before he built the company.

It’s inspiring to see.

And I love this quote. "Is there a path to make this something that millions of people could potentially one day use and make normal, like just make it boring? Like, how do you make flying cars boring one day?"

Catch the full conversation below.

Comments, questions, inquiries? Message me.

Heart Aerospace flew its X1 demonstrator on Wednesday out of Plattsburgh International Airport in upstate New York.

A piloted test flight. Taxi, takeoff, climb, maneuvering, landing. All under an FAA experimental airworthiness certificate.

The all-electric propulsion system delivered more than a megawatt. At 25,000 pounds and a 106-foot wingspan, X1 is the largest battery-electric aircraft ever flown.

It soared for 27 minutes. Heart says the electricity cost ~$5.

Fill the same 27 minutes with Jet A, and you’re looking at roughly 64 gallons. So I went and checked the costs around the country.

Los Angeles is the cheapest of the four markets, and it’s still 111x more expensive.

The company projects operating costs may be 40% less than legacy regional aircraft.

Innovation at its finest.

X1 is a demonstrator for the ES-30, a 30-seat hybrid-electric regional airliner chasing FAA Part 25 certification, with entry into service slated for 2031. United, Air Canada and JSX are on the order book.

Read more about Heart here.

This afternoon I’m heading to Aspen to meet with our local Sister Cities chapter.

I’ve been eyeing this organization for a while. It connects Aspen to towns around the world, offering several exchange programs - Adaptive Skiing, Arts + Culture, Medical, Ski Patrol, and Students.

I’m less interested in the recreational exchange opportunities and more focused on connecting with folks who live // work on a global scale. I’d like to find someone who shares a similar affinity for cutting-edge technology that materially improves our lives.

And if you’ve followed me for some time, you know I’m very intrigued by the activity in Argentina.

After Milei’s Presidential victory in 2024, the Argentina country ETF was the single best-performing country ETF in the following 12 months.

We’ve also seen news of Elon collaborating with the Argentine government, and Peter Thiel recently relocated his family to Buenos Aires. 

I’m not going to act like I know what's going on down South.

I follow price and track the movement of the World’s biggest whales.

But I’ll share tonight’s findings in a later post.

This trend, the Aerial Economy, is not exclusive to the United States.

It’s a global trend - and I wouldn’t be surprised if other countries find ways to adopt innovative aerial solutions before Uncle Sam.

We’re already seeing it.

Check out what’s happening in China and across Africa. 

The thing that really excites me about this transportation trend is that the greatest impact will be seen in the rural communities often overlooked by the masses. ie the “flyover states” we hold near and dear to our hearts.

I digress.

Ondas Posts Record-Setting Earnings, Again

In other news, Ondas Holdings reported earnings early this morning.

The company posted another record-setting quarter with revenue soaring 13X YoY.

Yes - the majority of this growth has been captured by way of M&A, which is exactly what one can expect to see from a former hedge fund manager turned CEO.

The stock is down 7% as I type. But the pros own the close.

It’s a marathon. Not a sprint.

We live in the most exciting time! 

The FAA expects US air travel to double in the next twenty years. One billion to two. 

Today’s system cannot support that. 

Not the towers. Not the runways. Not the airframes. 

The industry needs a top-to-bottom overhaul.

Advanced Air Mobility is supposed to be the answer. Drones and eVTOLs. But the evolution moves slower than a snail's pace. 

Safety, certification, regulation. Complex problems with complex solutions. 

The slow pace makes sense. But it doesn’t change the deadline.

I like to watch the leading edge for signs of what breaks the logjam. 

Last weekend, something strange happened in Dayton. 

DARPA ran its Lift Challenge. More than 70 teams, one rule that mattered: carry 4x your weight over five nautical miles, in an airframe that weighs less than 55 lbs. 

Nobody hit 4:1. 

Avidrone came closest at 3.84:1. A 29lbs aircraft hauling 112lbs of cast iron. 

Its machine was a single main-rotor helicopter. The configuration we’ve been flying since the 1940s. 

Third place went to Xtreme Aerial Concepts at 3.45:1. Also a helicopter design. 

For reference, today’s best multirotors sit at 1:1 or less. A DJI Agras T50 weighs 115lbs and carries 85lbs - a 0.75:1 ratio.

The old shape beat the best production drone flying today by 5x. 

I’m not an engineer. But I know what a signal looks like. 

The obvious counter: a 29lbs helicopter hauling cast iron is not a six-seat air taxi. Rotor efficiency scales. Noise, redundancy, and passenger comfort don't follow the same curve.

Fair. But the question still stands.

We've spent a decade adding rotors, tilt mechanisms, and distributed propulsion to solve lift. A team on a museum lawn in Ohio got closer with a design our grandparents would recognize.

Maybe today's eVTOLs are over-engineered.

Maybe the path of least resistance for electric aircraft isn't reinventing the wheel. It's electrifying the one that already works.

The eVTOLs in the media are cool. They look slick. But cool, slick aircraft don't move mass.

And if demand doubles while airframes stay this inefficient, we need more aircraft, more energy, and more ground to do the same work.

I'm curious to hear what you think. Message me.

Here are a few links that caught my fancy,

Skydrive Studies Regional EVTOL Applications In Asia

Olson Kundig Crowns Sky View House with Retractable Roof 

Designing the Future of Ground & Air Transportation Infrastructure

Boeing to Fold Its Flying-Taxi Venture Into Rival Archer Aviation

Joby Builds Defense Division with $500M Acquisition of Resonant Sciences

Feels good to get back in the swing of things.

This week, I’m closely watching DARPA’s Vertical Lift Challenge in Dayton, Ohio.

The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency’s Vertical Lift Challenge is a heavy-lift competition. Its rules are simple.

• Build a drone that carries at least 4x its own weight.

• Fly it 5 nautical miles.

• Land inside 30 minutes.

That’s the test.

Most drones today barely lift their own weight. That limit is why they typically just carry cameras.

DARPA put $6.5M to push this limit.

Finals run through tomorrow at the National Museum of the US Air Force.

It’s important we understand the true cost of weight when it comes to aviation. I’m still learning.

But the faster we lift the lift constraint, the sooner we’ll see widespread package delivery, rapid wildfire response, and flying cars like the Jetsons.

Here’s a link to the live stream.

And my favorite piece of merch.

Godspeed.

If you have questions, shoot me an email. Grateful to connect with like-minded individuals :)

Welcome back. 

It’s been a minute. Slow summer markets. But school’s around the corner. And the whales are finding their desks. 

Let’s get to it. 

The Registry

Since mid-March, I’ve collected the FAA flight registry data. They publish the full US aircraft registry on a daily basis. 

I vibe coded the collection command on a whim. And it’s turned into the best window I have into what’s actually flying in this country. 

Not what gets announced. Not what raises a round. But what gets a tail number? 

Here’s what the data says, 

Zipline registered more aircraft than Cessna. 1,055 new tail numbers for the delivery drone company since mid-March. DJI took 698. Cessna managed 557. 

10,077 agricultural drones. The Aerial Economy is alive and well in agriculture. 

The median American single-engine airplane was built in 1976. American aviation is a museum with an engine. 

15,077 electric aircraft in the US. Nearly two-thirds of these aircraft were certified in the last twenty-four months. 98.6% are unmanned. Electric aviation is here. It just doesn’t carry human passengers yet. 

Tale of the Tape

I still track public markets. I’ll never not. It’s a global language. We use the price action to piece together the puzzle of what’s next. 

Markets, like life, are reflexive. 

So here’s a chart that makes you scratch your head.

Rolls-Royce - not the automobile maker, BMW has owned that label since 1998 - but the jet engine manufacturer is up 2,500% since October 2022. 

What’s more interesting is that $RYCEY has outperformed the AI darling $NVDA since our pivot low in October 2022. 

Yes, I’m cherry-picking data, but who would’ve guessed?

Bombardier - the Canadian business jet manufacturer flies at all-time highs. Their Global 8000 is the fastest civil aircraft since Concorde. Mach 0.95. The demand // need for speed is real.

And Park Aerospace - an advanced composite materials manufacturer trades at its highest price since 2001.

The eVTOL stocks remain below their SPAC // IPO listing price. Certification can’t come soon enough.

Drone warfare and space exploration have the Street’s spotlight, but folks - something big is happening in aviation. 

My focus lies on the front lines. It’s a mega trend. I’m all in.

Oshkosh

I made my way to Oshkosh a few weeks back to see what all the fuss was about at the “world’s largest airshow” - “CES of aviation.”

What a scene. Overwhelming. The crowd was buzzing. 

I caught a glimpse of Joby and Beta’s eVTOL aircraft. 

But the Vision Jet captured my attention. A sleek, sports car-like body that travels from Aspen to Sedona in just over an hour unlocks a new level in life. 

Freedom of flight.

Time + space are less of a constraint in one’s day-to-day. Check out Packy McCormick’s post on “Expanding the Radius of Daily Life.”

You Can Just Build Things

The trip to Wisconsin was twofold.

Many moons ago, I connected with Grant Fisk. (h/t Nicolas Zart + Tom Lydon)

Grant is the founder of Volatus Infrastructure, now known as Volatus Power International. 

He’s one of the first innovators to comprehend the full hardware stack of what a vertiport requires.

I’m thrilled to find a hands-on opportunity to build in the Aerial Economy. 

I’ll shoot you straight. Vertiports are still a ways away. 

At this moment, we’re finding product-market fit with ground-based DC fast charging and an electric generator that really intrigues me. We also have a drone sister co. 

I’ll share more on this later.

Founders + Friends

In the meantime, here’s what I captured over the last few weeks. 

Four conversations. Builders, dreamers, and the delusionally optimistic.

Heather Chirtea flies a Pivotal BlackFly aka a flying car. First woman to do it. She is one of the forty-nine. YouTube - Spotify.

Nicolas Zart has covered electric vehicles and advanced air mobility for twenty years. He has seen this movie before, and he'll tell you which parts to skip. YouTube - Spotify.

Sam Bregman founded Melts. Dissolvable supplements, built from scratch. YouTube - Spotify.

Howard Lindzon founded StockTwits and invented the cashtag. He has been early to more things than most people are ever late to. YouTube - Spotify.

If you have questions, shoot me an email. Grateful to connect with like-minded individuals :)