AirDodge is a Norwegian company with an HQ in Oslo, Norway. We are building an automated air traffic management system(termed as U-Space software) to enable scalable drone operations. Our target end customers will be drone operators.
U-Space solves the problem for all drone operators by making it much easier to obtain permissions. It enables large scale Beyond Visual Line of Sight (BVLOS) operations whereof today this is too costly for most companies. It also makes it safer for manned aviation such as emergency helicopters that will have full visibility of ongoing drone flights in the area they are approaching. Other drone operators such as police, search and rescue will be able to quickly deploy drones opposed to wait for helicopters to arrive. They may also mandate quick clearing of drones from any given area in case such operations must take place.
Our solution is to build our own software platform and provide flight services according to the EASA framework recently published. These services will be legally required and the 4 primary services are defined by:
1) Drone Identification: This service will be focused on providing information on all the live drone traffic in U-Space to all participants (operators in the air).
2) Live Air Traffic Identification: This service will be focused on providing information on all the live manned air traffic in U-Space. All manned air traffic has to make themselves electronically visible if flying in U-Space. If a manned aircraft flies too close to a drone, then the drone pilot/operator will receive a warning message.
3) Geo-Zones: These are the core geographical definitions of airspaces on map where drone operators can see where they can or cannot fly. Examples of restricted airspaces include airports, military bases, prisons, bird sanctuaries, obstacles etc. Having an extensive dataset which displays all the possible flight restriction/warning zones is significantly important to drone operators as it ensures compliance and more efficient flight planning.
4) Flight Authorization: This gives drone operators the ability to ensure their flight path does not intersect/conflict with any other operators conducting drone flights in the same airspace. The flight authorization will require drone pilots to submit their flight path in 4 dimensions which include 3D trajectory and time. Flight authorization will also allow drone pilots to communicate with Air Traffic control to request a drone flight in restricted airspace. The response times for both types of requests will be instant.
AirDodge was founded in May 2022 by Umar Chughtai who started a previous drone based powerline inspection company called Skyqraft. At Skyqraft, he was responsible for leading the drone operations and he became aware of all the pains surrounding commercial drone flying. This experience became a source of inspiration for solving such problems through AirDodge.
We are backed by Antler and also received grant funding from Innovation Norway.