 Think Tech Away, civil engagement lives here. It is noon hour Thursday folks, Ted Ralston here in our Think Tech studios downtown Honolulu with Waimanalo Beach showing in the background here by the process of electronic relocation. Anyway, our show where the drone is, we bring to our trusted viewing public the information about drones, what's going on, the people involved in drones and such. Today we have an incredible set of guests on line standing by. Again, by Electronic Magic in Las Vegas, Nevada. We have on the right Chuck Devaney, one of our UH expatriates and an international figure in this game of droneism. And we have Jeff Scholl sitting next to him, both executives in the firm quadrocopter in Las Vegas. Welcome on board, Chuck, and welcome to the first time on the show, Jeff. Thank you, thank you, Ted, good to have you on us. So what we see in the background here, what you're seeing left is a whole bunch of equipment. That's really cool. We don't have any on the table here to not dominate the scene. You got it right back there and you got it displayed well. So tell us a little bit about quadrocopter, kind of where it came from, where it's headed to kind of work you do. And what's really interesting to us in the developing world, and I don't mean we're in the third world, the developing world, but in the world of development is how you see requirements coming forth that you would like to nominate and get pushed into the manufacturing side of the house or into the standard side of the house. There's so much going on in the world of sensor development, system development, you got hybrids, you got quadrotors, you got multi-rotors, you got fixed wing, and we got all kinds of sensors, all kinds of sensor analytics, and we have standards coming. How do you, as a guy who's trying to make money at this, see yourselves advising that direction and also not getting tangled up in it too much? So tell us a little bit about quadrocopter and where it's all going. Go ahead, Jeff. Well, so quadrocopter started, we're probably going about 2010, so about eight years ago, and we started selling a lot of, it was microcopter out of Germany. So a lot of their flight controllers, we also started, they were pretty much the early adopters for GPS like 3.9. So we were, well, and the thing with the German build is they were very complicated. It was pretty hard. You almost had to live in that world to really understand them. So we would build them, we would support them, and we would train people on them. So that's where we pretty much took off. And we, initially it was pretty much just people wanting to take pretty pictures and then pretty video. So then leading up into cinematography. However, now we're definitely segwaying into the enterprise space. So that's where Rob comes in with his mapping, his background, his master's in co-op adopters. Yeah, exactly. It all started out, Ted, as we all know from the cinematography world, and that's where Jeff really has kind of pushed the forefront of the movement in terms of how these aircraft are used and how the regulations have kind of evolved. We know that the TV world and whatnot has really pushed the regulations. So now they brought me on board to kind of help them move more into the services and enterprise space in terms of mapping and mapping infrastructure and total solutions, total builds, not only from multi-rotors, but also fixed wings in the light. So are you guys in the world in a game of actually designing and developing your own quadcopters and your own sensor sets at this point in time or basically adopting what manufacturers have already made and made available to you and then you go exploit that in the commercial world? Probably the latter part. We were doing a lot of R&D initially, but gosh, you can get something out of a box off the shelf with pretty good success right now, plus not quite as much support you would have to do in the past. So yeah, definitely. Yeah, I don't know that, I didn't really have any interest on building a quadcopter right now. Yeah, but compete with all the other building with solar, it's just too easy. Yeah, you know, back in the day, Ted, we used to have to build a lot of our own stuff, especially before we went to the Philippines, we would have these big, huge building efforts and everything was custom because that's what we had to do, but there's a lot more offerings out there where we don't really need to do that anymore. Yeah, the days of burning myself with a soldering iron, I think, are over. That's interesting. I mean, we still do it. So we've seen a transition here. Chuck, you and I met probably five years ago on this various game, and it was all really expensive systems or hand-built, you had your choice. And things have come down in price and gone up in capability and now availability. And so, but there's still motion going forward. So if you were thinking from the perspective of the pretty pictures and the analytical products you generate at quadcopter, what would you pick as say the top three items that you wanted to inform the industry about in terms of what direction you want them to go? More capacity, more payload, be online of sight, multi-spectral sensing, lead-up, you know, cluster operations or fleet operations, what would come to mind is something that would really improve your ability to execute business if you had it? Well, the be online of sight, that's always gonna be the big one, especially for the enterprise because people just want to hit the button, have it autonomously take off and gather data and... Yeah, exactly. Not even, not to even be on the ground, just have it autonomously take off. So that's, I'm gonna say that one's probably in the forefront. Yeah. As far as like, you know, evolving sensors, probably the size and weight, if they could reduce that without giving up resolution and capability, that would be helpful and might be helpful to move some of the analytics to the camera rather than have the heavy lifting in a CPU that's either on board or on the ground. So we're talking about autonomy and be online of sight. We're talking about miniaturization and higher resolution retained and talking about onboard processing and that means full of computer vision orientation of extracting information from the stream and sending it down just the reduced result rather than the entire result for post-processing. So... Correct. And let the machine learn and continue to learn and that's where we're heading is into the artificial intelligence or the deep learning world. So deep learning, computer vision, augmented reality, these things are the terms that are starting to come around the corner here. And it just, we're kind of on the developing side at the Applied Research Lab at UH. We try to generate programs that the students can get involved in and the professors and such and turn these things in a positive direction. We're really at the point of trying to come up with what those specific requirements might be. And one thing that goes to my mind, Chuck and you, as a diver would certainly, I think, understand is the issue of animal mimicry, that is mimicking how animals behave and how they make decisions with their 29 cent processors inside their brain compared to the much more expensive processors we have. But just think of the, like the, a holy, holy fish that runs in a school and they all move together, they all seem to respond to stimuli somehow at the same time and they all scatter when there's a threat but then they reform right away. So how do they do it? Nobody designed their little processor. So exactly how we should think about this future is one of sort of cognition. That is, how are decisions made and how is the decision that you want to have made, such as what Jeff outlined, how is that then supported by information and how is that then made reliable so that it can execute correctly and not have an adverse effect and then also protect itself against malicious input. So it seems to me to start with cognition and you guys were on the cognitive end of this in terms of what the products need to be and how those products need to relate to each other. So there's some kind of a tie here between what we want as consumers and how frankly how relatively inexpensive animals perform that with similar missions or acts today. So I've been thinking about to get the guys at UH together and ask them that question, okay, you folks involved in botany and biology and such, how do you see the animal cognition to create a term? The people in cartooning actually have to mimic human behavior in certain ways. They have a lot of knowledge and insight into how groups of people behave because they have to illustrate that properly in a cartoon. And so there's a whole domain of experience and knowledge outside of our typical UAS, motors and ESCs and flight management system domain that we can tap into. So I've been in the process of thinking that through. That's why I'm throwing it in front of you guys. It's huge to think. It makes sense to me. Yeah, it makes perfect sense to me. It's just how do you actually implement that idea? So you can do that computer modeling, but then when you actually take that and put it into the physical world, how do you actually make that happen to where a unit that will be in a swarm underwater behaves much like a fish or a school of goat fish or a flock of birds, for example, which behave very much in the same way where they're very self-aware and are able to make a sudden move collectively at a moment's notice to a bird, a possible predator, something like, how do you make that happen? How does that work in the real world? You need to have neural nanotechnology. Neural nanotechnology with like multiple segmented bodies, something, you know? And miniaturized with high resolution and high reliability. Other than that, it's a pretty easy thing to take on. Very efficient too. They've got to have zero battery life. The fuel has to be nothing and it has to work off static electricity from the air. Or like the Kolea. The Kolea bugger, they're getting ready to make their trip to Alaska. They do the whole trip on four ounces of body material. And let's talk about how we might take an existing opportunity in the Western Pacific to illustrate that future direction after we get back from our single break in this one half hour show. You're right. Aloha Kakao. I am Andrea. I am from Italy. And I've been studying and working here in Hawaii for more than three years for my PhD. Hawaii is home to a truly fantastic community of middle and high school students. And did you know some of them are currently out there right now using their free time to invent new quantum computers? And did you know some of them are exploring cyber security and the new frontiers of robotics? I am just always amazed as I talk to them at science fairs. Oh, but there's more. Did you know that these students are coming here on Think Tech Hawaii to hear their story with us? Come and join the new young talents making way show and discover how these students are shaping our future. Starting on February the 6th, every Tuesday at 11 a.m. Only here at Think Tech Hawaii. Mahalo. It is still the noon hour in Thursday and Waimanalo and Honolulu folks here at Ted Rawlston. It's not quite the noon hour in Las Vegas or our two guests are standing by. Jeff Shoal, the chief technology officer and Chuck Devaney the vice president of business development at Quadrocopter in Las Vegas. Gentlemen, thanks for coming on again and welcome back after our one minute break here. What I wanted to do was take that discussion we were having about how you operate and how you capitalize on people that have developed and figure out how to take that next step and define what that next step must be. We talked about animal mimicry in terms of how complex systems behave and behave safely and reliably. We've had a couple of programs coming up that you're gonna be involved in that might give us some insight in this area. And just for the reference, those are the FAA, UAS integrated pilot program which is gonna be awarded in May. We hear maybe even next month and we don't know if we're gonna win one but we're certainly in there as an applicant. And then we have the EPSCOR, UAS program favoring resilience and seal over rise preparation in the Western Pacific, which is a really complicated, structured approach towards merging technology with human value. So within those two programs, we'll have an opportunity to do testing and generate feedback that fits the conversation we had earlier. But in order to do that, we have to think of fielding teams. So if we take the first one that is probably a more sure deal than the FAA and that's the EPSCOR program or even the secondary program that we might be able to work with the Marshall Islands. Chuck, what we're gonna do is put together teams of four to six people, something like that, like our Philippines team, something like that that can go into field for 10 days or 20 days, disconnecting from what they're doing, move to the field in the Western Pacific Islands and perform UAS operations, analysis and instruction to the Islanders and have leave behind when they leave that is a higher capability in the hands of the locals when that's done. And then they have to follow it with another team, another. And this could be a continuous operation but we think we've got a leg up on that. You as a experienced in the Philippines and experienced in the United States and this sort of thing, how would we put together that team? Who are we gonna turn to to get people to perform that kind of function and mission? How are we gonna credential them, get them to a same level of standard pilot operations on the UAS and maybe even on the analysis side? What are your thoughts on that, Chuck? Well, we've already identified a few people that I think that we can rely on to be that first team to be able to go out and say train the trainers, right? So they'll be the head unit and it's gonna take maybe one or two iterations to make sure that it's sound. So in my understanding, the model is going to be kind of a crawl, walk, run model whereas the first part of it might be something as simple as making sure people understand how to properly operate the aircraft safely and reliably. So that's gonna come with battery management, that's gonna come with fleet management, et cetera, et cetera. And then that's gonna move on to making sure that they're able to collect the data the first time so they don't have to go back and do it again. So they're actually collecting the proper data in the right spot during the right time of the day, safely and without any error. And then that will then segue into the post-processing on that data into what seems to be the most interesting to them are the digital elevation model which they don't currently have in many of those specific islands. So given what we've learned in the past, doing a lot of the coastal monitoring that we did in Hawaii and the post-disaster work that we did in the Philippines, it'll be pretty easy for us to put together that first team and then deployment. We'll have to figure out what it's going to take to have a team of say six people to be able to operate in the field for 10 to 15 days without having the hobby store right down the road to be able to go get the parts and the stuff breaks. Same kind of model as it was in the Philippines, but this time it's not going to be putting together an ad hoc team. We have a lot of experience behind us to be able to put that together. And that's actually not so much in a capacity building arena that we've seen before or what is going to happen with this EPSCORE project in the Pacific, but these are things that we do every day. We manage the aircraft, we manage batteries. It's a part of our life. We live it every single day. We go out to job sites. We collect the data. We collect the data the right the first time. We post-process it and then we put it into our data management platform that we developed in-house. So it's easier for us to disseminate that data without having that bottleneck that we ran into almost instantaneously with this huge influx of data. So what you're talking about is kind of work backwards from the desired end state which is measurements of some physical characteristics that are highly appropriate to the sea level rise situation in the Pacific. And you've identified digital elevation model that leads to understanding inundation at least understanding potential for landslides and structural aspects in the load-bearing aspects of the soil. Agriculture is a factor as well. So if we thought of, maybe aquaculture even, if you thought of those three things, then you're leading us in a great direction. Start with the end state of what that analyzed function has to be back into what the protocol is that makes the collection possible and makes it reliable and makes it repetitive and makes it safe from penetration by somebody who shouldn't have access to it. So all the access issues. And then you finally figure out, okay, what equipment do we need? And then we take that and find the people who can go to the work which is going to be the hard part because we've got to take those people and that protocol you've talked about and put it together somewhere, maybe here in Hawaii, where the people can all get together and make sure that we've learned the art properly and obey the protocols properly before going into the field. So I can see assembly here in Hawaii and then moving on to the field as a two-step process. That's sound about right to you? It sounds about right. As we've always kind of preached, the mission defines the platform. So we will define what that, or the mission will seek out what that set of question is. Questions are whether it's whoever is interested in the agricultural component or the vegetation component as it pertains to coastal management and coastal structure and coastal geomorphology. And then that can segue into characterization of coastal geomorphology, which is very, very important for those low-lying coastal nations. I think what you've outlined here, especially capturing on video is exactly the position we should take to Paul Haddock who was on the show a while ago talking about this need. And Greg Nakano, of course, who's not here today. But we can do that. And then maybe what we could do to staff up is turn to the 25 or 26 partners we have on this IPP program and see how many of them have folks that they would be willing to contribute to the effort. And there is funding for this. So that is not an out-of-your-own-pocket-type thing necessarily, as we know about what other programs have been. So I think we should take that forward. I'll begin to take that idea forward to Paul. And Jeff, from the pretty pictures perspective or the perspective of expression and common understanding of what we're doing, this is a great opportunity, I think, this particular program to use that aspect of it as well. I mean, we shouldn't just stick with the technical stuff. We should deal with the values of the people and tell a story about this. So storytelling becomes a part of this as well. In fact, capturing the entire flow from this very program forward to the assembly of the people, the training, the protocols, and the deployment. If I could see an understanding of cinematography, cinema, the graphic, whatever the proper word is, coming out of this. We can always make a documentary into that. Yeah, there's always, yeah, hard to tell. Okay, that sounds cool. So I'll do that, we'll take this very result and push it forward and then expect you to help us lay this thing together, get the story in front of Paul, and let's see what we can do. Exactly, and there's also gonna be the hardware component. We need to be able to know where we can source that. So we need that partner. So we can do that here at Quadrocopter as well. Okay, in fact, you could be the decision maker and the recommender on what the proper hardware is and the proper software, for that matter. Kind of on the technical side, defining what that workflow looks like. Yep, absolutely. And this thing. So looking forward, when do we go to Hawaii? Okay, well, how about next week? Actually, next week we have the PAKOM S&T Conference. Two weeks we have the PAKOM S&T Conference out here and we have some other work. So we're tied up through the middle of March, but that's the timing that would be the first available, I think. So we'll go to that. Now you're... PAKOM has a lot to do with this, right? PAKOM has something to do with this NASS F-score grant or some sort of interest, without that understanding from... The relationship with PAKOM is continually increasing and broadening in scope. In fact, Vincent, who I think is coming in tomorrow to talk to us about some of these things. So we'll keep you posted as that all develops. And I think at this point, we, believe it or not, have run through our half hour, which goes by so quickly. And so let me just thank you two for coming on, taking the middle of the day in Las Vegas and joining us here in Hawaii. By the way, Las Vegas is considered the eighth island, as you know, in the Hawaiian orientation. So Chuck Devaney, a frequent flyer on the show and Jeff Scholl, a first-timer. Thanks so much for coming on and we'll get this program going in the Western Pacific. Thank you very much. All right, thanks. Good to see you. Take care, bye.