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Don't take this the wrong way but... I think its hard to avoid the elephant in the room that blimp cargo has been a dream ever since the invention of the blimp

Don't take this the wrong way but... I think its hard to avoid the elephant in the room that blimp cargo has been a dream ever since the invention of the blimp, and if we put your technology claims to one side (because they are more an assistant, not an enabler) I'm not too sure what makes you any different ? Look at what is perhaps your most recent competitor ... Flying Whales. Going since 2012, burning through cash like there's no tomorrow ($30m Quebec, €225m France etc. etc.) , and so far maybe promising some sort of prototype by 2024 (already slipped from 2021). What really makes you so different from prior dreamers and in particular your present competitors ?

lyime 5y ago
Basically why now?
- Benclaman 5y ago
  The economics on small airships only work if they're unmanned, and now is pretty much the best time ever to develop unmanned aircraft.
quadcore 5y ago
Entirely fair question I think. I'd add that execution can easily be the difference. Notably french startups generally have poor execution. For example, the entrepreneur in France generally has to get loan on his own person, indebting himself, "to be sure he believes in his own idea".
- traceroute66 5y ago
  > indebting himself, "to be sure he believes in his own idea". Putting the French specific comment to one side because I don't have sufficient knowledge to comment, what I would say is that having "skin in the game" is no bad thing (it focuses your mind, and demonstrates your commitment to others). That's one of the problems with the US funding scene. On one side its great because people will throw obscene amounts of money at you if your marketing pitch sells well enough. One the other hand, it does lead to the situation where your commitment to the business only goes so far because you've basically always got someone else picking up the tab.
  - mensetmanusman 5y ago
    On average it has worked spectacularly well though. Most founders aren’t taking a risk (they tend to come from wealthy families) they are executing a vision.
    - _tom_ 5y ago
      Depends on whether by “average” you mean “median” or “mean”! I’d bet the median return on startups is negative.
      - deepnotderp 5y ago
        The entire point of venture capital is to have 9 failures out of 10 and 1 that returns the entire fund
  - tjs8rj 5y ago
    How frequently does this happen in reality? The reality is: startups are risky. Forcing the entrepreneur to take a bigger chunk of that risk than necessary leads to less innovation, playing it safe, and kills many businesses before they’ve left the ground. Would Airbnb exist? Would Coinbase exist? Would uber exist? Maybe, but probably not, because the founders here weren’t rich enough to absorb the costs given the odds. In theory, having that much skin in the game sounds like a pro with small cons. The reality is that is kills innovation, leaves the few brave enough who fail indebted and hampered for years, and makes the successful a fraction of the scale (and disproportionately founded by those already rich).
    - GDC7 5y ago
      Companies providing those services would exist anyways. The profile of the person founding them would be different. You'd have istrionic risk takers, borderline gamblers carrying the company for the first say 5 years, then they'd be bought out and a more stable person would be brought in. The VC model enables the economy at large to artificially skip the first step. It's artificial because Silicon Valley companies which basically start from zero and arrive in the S&P500 in 20 years or less, they have very low turnover in managment and executives. It's like a Vietcong learning how to fly an F-35.
- atlasunshrugged 5y ago
  I'm not french but spent a fair amount of time in the EU tech ecosystem and I think that "Notably french startups generally have poor execution." is a super general statement that isn't fair to apply. I mean Bernard Arnault, one of the wealthiest people in the world, built LVMH and the government has been working hard via the la french tech initiative and Station F to make the startup ecosystem much more friendly.
  - EmilyHATFIELD 5y ago
    I think you're thinking about Xavier Niel, which created Free, Station F and 42
  - c_o_n_v_e_x 5y ago
    I worked for a French founder for a few years and was quite involved with a lot of French people and companies (Thales, Veolia, Engie... to name a few) in tech. I'll reserve my comments about my own personal experience but I think the characterization of poor execution is a bit sweeping. Where I think the French and American start up communities differ is that failure is not generally accepted in France, whereas in the US it's acknowledged and somewhat accepted to have a few "duds" on the resume.
- _tom_ 5y ago
  The loan approach misses the fact the the entrepreneur is going to spend several years of his life on the project. Nobody starts a company they don’t believe in. The cost is too high, even without the loans.
Benclaman 5y ago
We're not planning to build something that's 600 feet long and costs hundreds of millions, we're building something that's 60 feet long and costs hundreds of thousands. Unmanned blimps of this size don't require the same amount of capital, so we can fly faster and get to market faster.
- traceroute66 5y ago
  But do you escape the regulatory requirements and the practical constraints ?
  - joefigura 5y ago
    We'll spend a lot of time on certification. We need two things: a type-certification of the aircraft, and operator certifications for the organizations flying them. Both require a lot of flight hours, which will be our main development activity. There's no escaping aircraft regulation, but we have a clear path Hopefully we've responded to practical constraints in other answers, but if not let me know questions.
- uncoder0 5y ago
  Very good answer. The key difference is the size it also offers you much more flexibility it would seem in terms of the role you can fill. You can always add more blimps.
- elihu 5y ago
  Supposing you had unlimited engineering resources and development or capital costs weren't an issue, are smaller blimps fundamentally superior to larger ones in some important way? For instance, are smaller blimps inherently faster or easier to control in windy conditions?
- ramesh31 5y ago
  > we're building something that's 60 feet long and costs hundreds of thousands. Why still hundreds of thousands? Blimps are an incredibly simple, cheap technology, and drone hardware is completely commoditized at this point.
dmix 5y ago
I don't understand why it took so long for them to build a prototype? 12 years?
thehappypm 5y ago
This is such a terrible critique, in my opinion. Just because something's never been done well doesn't mean it's impossible.
- Ma8ee 5y ago
  That many have tried and failed hints that there might be something there that is harder than it looks.
  - thehappypm 5y ago
    "Many"? How many blimp startups have here been in the modern era?

lyime 5y ago

Basically why now?

Benclaman 5y ago
The economics on small airships only work if they're unmanned, and now is pretty much the best time ever to develop unmanned aircraft.

quadcore 5y ago

Entirely fair question I think. I'd add that execution can easily be the difference. Notably french startups generally have poor execution. For example, the entrepreneur in France generally has to get loan on his own person, indebting himself, "to be sure he believes in his own idea".

traceroute66 5y ago
> indebting himself, "to be sure he believes in his own idea". Putting the French specific comment to one side because I don't have sufficient knowledge to comment, what I would say is that having "skin in the game" is no bad thing (it focuses your mind, and demonstrates your commitment to others). That's one of the problems with the US funding scene. On one side its great because people will throw obscene amounts of money at you if your marketing pitch sells well enough. One the other hand, it does lead to the situation where your commitment to the business only goes so far because you've basically always got someone else picking up the tab.
- mensetmanusman 5y ago
  On average it has worked spectacularly well though. Most founders aren’t taking a risk (they tend to come from wealthy families) they are executing a vision.
  - _tom_ 5y ago
    Depends on whether by “average” you mean “median” or “mean”! I’d bet the median return on startups is negative.
    - deepnotderp 5y ago
      The entire point of venture capital is to have 9 failures out of 10 and 1 that returns the entire fund
- tjs8rj 5y ago
  How frequently does this happen in reality? The reality is: startups are risky. Forcing the entrepreneur to take a bigger chunk of that risk than necessary leads to less innovation, playing it safe, and kills many businesses before they’ve left the ground. Would Airbnb exist? Would Coinbase exist? Would uber exist? Maybe, but probably not, because the founders here weren’t rich enough to absorb the costs given the odds. In theory, having that much skin in the game sounds like a pro with small cons. The reality is that is kills innovation, leaves the few brave enough who fail indebted and hampered for years, and makes the successful a fraction of the scale (and disproportionately founded by those already rich).
  - GDC7 5y ago
    Companies providing those services would exist anyways. The profile of the person founding them would be different. You'd have istrionic risk takers, borderline gamblers carrying the company for the first say 5 years, then they'd be bought out and a more stable person would be brought in. The VC model enables the economy at large to artificially skip the first step. It's artificial because Silicon Valley companies which basically start from zero and arrive in the S&P500 in 20 years or less, they have very low turnover in managment and executives. It's like a Vietcong learning how to fly an F-35.
atlasunshrugged 5y ago
I'm not french but spent a fair amount of time in the EU tech ecosystem and I think that "Notably french startups generally have poor execution." is a super general statement that isn't fair to apply. I mean Bernard Arnault, one of the wealthiest people in the world, built LVMH and the government has been working hard via the la french tech initiative and Station F to make the startup ecosystem much more friendly.
- EmilyHATFIELD 5y ago
  I think you're thinking about Xavier Niel, which created Free, Station F and 42
- c_o_n_v_e_x 5y ago
  I worked for a French founder for a few years and was quite involved with a lot of French people and companies (Thales, Veolia, Engie... to name a few) in tech. I'll reserve my comments about my own personal experience but I think the characterization of poor execution is a bit sweeping. Where I think the French and American start up communities differ is that failure is not generally accepted in France, whereas in the US it's acknowledged and somewhat accepted to have a few "duds" on the resume.
_tom_ 5y ago
The loan approach misses the fact the the entrepreneur is going to spend several years of his life on the project. Nobody starts a company they don’t believe in. The cost is too high, even without the loans.

Benclaman 5y ago

We're not planning to build something that's 600 feet long and costs hundreds of millions, we're building something that's 60 feet long and costs hundreds of thousands. Unmanned blimps of this size don't require the same amount of capital, so we can fly faster and get to market faster.

traceroute66 5y ago
But do you escape the regulatory requirements and the practical constraints ?
- joefigura 5y ago
  We'll spend a lot of time on certification. We need two things: a type-certification of the aircraft, and operator certifications for the organizations flying them. Both require a lot of flight hours, which will be our main development activity. There's no escaping aircraft regulation, but we have a clear path Hopefully we've responded to practical constraints in other answers, but if not let me know questions.
uncoder0 5y ago
Very good answer. The key difference is the size it also offers you much more flexibility it would seem in terms of the role you can fill. You can always add more blimps.
elihu 5y ago
Supposing you had unlimited engineering resources and development or capital costs weren't an issue, are smaller blimps fundamentally superior to larger ones in some important way? For instance, are smaller blimps inherently faster or easier to control in windy conditions?
ramesh31 5y ago
> we're building something that's 60 feet long and costs hundreds of thousands. Why still hundreds of thousands? Blimps are an incredibly simple, cheap technology, and drone hardware is completely commoditized at this point.

dmix 5y ago

I don't understand why it took so long for them to build a prototype? 12 years?

thehappypm 5y ago

This is such a terrible critique, in my opinion. Just because something's never been done well doesn't mean it's impossible.

Ma8ee 5y ago
That many have tried and failed hints that there might be something there that is harder than it looks.
- thehappypm 5y ago
  "Many"? How many blimp startups have here been in the modern era?