Inside Unmanned Systems provides actionable business intelligence to decision-makers and influencers operating within the global UAS community. Features include analysis of key technologies, policy/regulatory developments and new product design.
Issue link: https://insideunmanned.epubxp.com/i/470284
special report 14 unmanned systems inside Spring 2014 Angling for Advantage All of the teams that spoke to Inside Unmanned Sys- tems are now scrambling to entice researchers and UAS entrepreneurs to their states. All but two are offering, or planning to offer, incentives to lure key players—and some of those incentives are quite creative. While tax breaks are the norm and money to support research is being offered by a num- ber of jurisdictions, economic development officers are also dangling gap loans, venture capital help, interest rate buy downs and, in the case of Oklahoma, an aerospace engineers tax credit. The program gives firms a credit of up to $12,500 per qualified employee per year for five years for each aerospace engineer it hires and a separate credit worth up to $5,000 a year to each aerospace engineer they bring on board. (Those who are interested shouldn't hesitate. This tax credit is currently set to ex- pire on December 31, 2014.) The states are competing scientifically as well. With a very few exceptions, like Alaska's work on using UASs to help ships navigate through ice-choked seas (see page 36), the states will be pursuing similar lines of re- search. At least 15 of the 19 test range teams will be engaged in finding ways to use UASs to improve agriculture, more than a dozen will be researching UAS technology includ- ing airframes, composites, communications and data handling, as well as miniaturization and sense-and-avoid techniques. At least half a dozen teams have institutions that are also working on land or marine autonomous ve- hicles that could benefit from breakthroughs in UAS technology. Picking Winners The level of activity poses a potential dilemma for the FAA. The FAA test ranges are not be- ing paid to do the agency's research. To make the numbers work both the FAA and the range managers are counting on researchers and companies to choose to come to one of the six FAA test ranges and fly for their own purposes. The six ranges are to gather information (but not propriety data) from these experiments to flesh out the risk models the FAA needs. Though some data is already reported back on every FAA-authorized unmanned flight, the work descriptions released for the ranges sug- gest a more targeted effort to fill in the gaps. To succeed the FAA would appear to need the six to be particularly competitive and able to at- tract users. "The FAA has been pretty clear that they're not going to tell us what we have to do and I think our activities are going to be driven by the market," said Jon Greene, the interim ex- ecutive director of the Atlantic Aviation Part- nership and the Virginia Tech UAS test site. "We recognize that what we have to do is help the FAA get the data it needs in order to make risk-based decisions for UAS integration into the NAS," he added. "What the FAA needs to do is—they need to help us find a way to do that commercial work so that the states stay happy and see the benefit of jobs and we are able to create a sustainable business model." The FAA is stepping up to do exactly that. The vast majority of those interviewed, both from the The Shadow M2, built by AAI UAS, has been tested in Arizona, Maryland and Utah. Photos courtesy of AAI