Unveiling Innovation Blindness - We often fail to see the best ideas in front of us

Looking up gives us a new perspective and allows us to progress

Thank you to all my readers, old and new. Feel free to contact me at jonathan@skytrades.io to hear more about the marketplace we are building.

---

We fail to see whats in front of us. Some of the best ideas that can help us advance are here for the taking. But it’s not for everyone, sometimes square pegs don’t fit in round holes.

Bicycles started out with both wheels the same size and evolved so that the front one became very large and the rear wheel very small. Then the wheel sizes went back and found an equilibrium again. A demonstration in successful engineering evolution or people asking the wrong questions for too long?

This bicycle became a popular form of transportation among the best of people. Affluent and successful men in urban environments, clambered up on this interesting contraption to look down on the world. While it offered advantages like being able to transit on cobbled streets and it was a hobby for recreation it was very dangerous and difficult to mount and dismount. It was an impractical device masking as a revolutionary machine.

(Swiss Cycles)

The pedals where attached directly to the front wheel. Since there was no drivetrain on the bicycle the only way to make it go fast was to make the front wheel bigger. The result was the Penny Farthing where the front wheel was nearly 1.5 meters in diameter. The name Penny Farthing was derived from the Penny and the Farthing, two coins that were used as legal tender in Britain at the time, one being big and one being smaller in diameter.

Then one day the question was asked: Why not use a drivetrain to power the rear wheel?

John Kemp Starley is often credited with popularising the design of the safety bicycle which over took the Penny Farthing as the bicycle of choice.

A design that featured two wheels of equal size, a chain drive-train, and a diamond-shaped frame. With its lower centre of gravity and more stable design, the safety bicycle was as its name suggests safer and more comfortable to ride, making cycling more accessible and adopted by a wider range of people. This was then optimised to what we use today.

(bicycling.com)

Most people are creatures of convention. Those who claim to be contrarian tend to follow the same paths, the same reasoning and seek the same outcomes but mask it. This is one of the reasons we rarely get ground breaking innovations, but many think we have them.

If this was not the case we would already have our flying cars. We would have abundant clean energy. We would have solved persistent problems of poorly distributed resources, poverty and educational attainment.

Frightening Livestock

To restrict drone surveillance of livestock facilities without the permission of the property owner, the Iowa House recently passed legislation, House File 572. Drones, stated in the bill are remotely piloted aircraft. They would not be allowed to fly within 400 feet of where agricultural animals are housed, such as livestock feed yards, confinement operations and private property homesteads.

However, there is no need to add more legislation to existing legislation that already confers the air rights to the landowner. But legislators legislate, regulators regulate and growth stagnates.

Proponents of the bill, including Iowa Representative Derek Wulf (R-Hudson), says the drone bill provides privacy rights for Iowa farmers and ranchers as they care for the safety and security of their livestock. The bill follows previous Iowa legislation in an attempt to combat animal welfare organisations from unknowingly collecting images and videos that document conditions and treatment of animals without the consent of the owners.

Opposition to the bill came from business owners who use drones. The problem they have is that they are worried the bill could limit their ability to work in situations where drones are flown over multiple properties or in more densely populated areas. The solution is not to disregard the well established air rights of the property owners but allow them a way to define those rights and give the drone operators certainty so their businesses can flourish.

In response, the bill was amended to clarify the restrictions apply only to properties outside city limits and would not impact property owners flying drones over their own land. Additionally, exemptions for railroads and accidental intrusions “that do not linger over protected areas” were added. This is all getting very close to the bar for a trespass being increased in a round about way and property rights being eroded.

Wulf said the bill does not slow down the technological advances in the use of drones, as they are used more and more in different agricultural purposes. However he says it is a step in the right direction to protect Iowa producers in the safety and security of their livestock and operations.  Passing the House 87-10, the bill will next come before the Senate alongside, Senate File 520.

This is not the first time livestock has been the topic of concern when it come to low altitude air space. It was frightened chickens which led to the ratification in the landmark United States Supreme Court decision in USA v Causby where it ruled that,

A land owner's domain includes the airspace above it.

While we continue to pay legal council millions of dollars to ask courts to rule around this well defined topic, 80 years on there is a technological solution to this problem. Air rights owners can now register their air rights and decide how they want them used.

(Deepai)

Miami Flying Cars

The University of Miami's College of Engineering has launched the Miami Engineering Autonomous Mobility Initiative (MEAMI), a consortium of academic, industry, and government partners. The objective of MEAMI is to advance autonomous mobility technology, investigating issues such as advanced propulsion, sensing, and artificial intelligence, and addressing implementation in cities. MEAMI is dedicated to examining the use of air taxis and autonomous ground vehicles to transport people and cargo in Miami and other urban areas.

The consortium includes members like Eve Air Mobility, Aeroauto, and Ryder Systems and has the backing of public-sector partners like the U.S. Department of Energy, Department of Education, and Department of Transportation. Additionally, eVTOL aircraft manufacturer Eve is collaborating with other industry players to develop a concept of operations for urban air mobility (UAM) services connecting Miami International Airport (MIA) and the Miami Beach Convention Center. Other eVTOL aircraft manufacturers, including Archer, Lilium, and Supernal, have also expressed their interest in launching eVTOL air taxi services in the Miami area. Eve plans to supply its aircraft to operators, such as Global Crossing Airlines.

Flying Cars - The Runners and Riders

Several companies are working on developing flying cars that will revolutionise transportation. Here are seven of the most promising models:

1. The Terrafugia Transition is a hybrid car and airplane that can drive on roads and fly in the air. It has folding wings that allow it to fit into a standard garage.

2. The Pal-V Liberty is a gyroplane that can fly at speeds of up to 112 mph. It has a range of 310 miles and can be driven on the road like a car.

3. The SkyDrive SD-03 is a vertical takeoff and landing vehicle that can fly up to 10 feet off the ground. It has a range of 12 miles and can reach speeds of up to 40 mph.

4. The AeroMobil 4.0 is a flying car that can take off and land on any surface, including grass and water. It has a range of 435 miles and can reach speeds of up to 224 mph.

5. The EHang 216 is a passenger drone that can carry up to two people. It has a range of 21 miles and can fly at speeds of up to 80 mph.

6. The Lilium Jet is an electric vertical takeoff and landing jet that can fly up to 186 mph. It has a range of 155 miles and can carry up to seven passengers.

7. The Volocopter 2X is an electric helicopter that can fly up to 22 miles at speeds of up to 68 mph. It can carry two passengers and take off and land vertically.

Some of the key challenges that are slowing down our flying cars are:

• Regulation

• Safety

• Infrastructure

On regulation, depending on the jurisdiction this can be overcome with forward thinking regulators, if thats not oxymoron. The more bloated regulatory environments are the slowest and will miss a lot of the upside. The smaller more nimble jurisdictions will get the highest growth rates, think a successful seed investment return multiple, verses a series G multiple.

On safety, we have been flying aircraft for decades at acceptable risk levels and driving cars on our roads at acceptable risk levels, so this can be overcome. We must not let an illogical drive for total risk mitigation strangle our progress on this front. Keeping us wrapped safely in cotton wool but preventing us flying.

The third is infrastructure, often we rely on governments to take care of this, however for low altitude air space, private solutions are favourable to avoid misaligned incentives. What investors are asking themselves is do they want to own the railroad tracks or a train carriage?

The Future is Above Your Head

Urban Air Mobility (UAM) is the way we will positively grow our communities. Making sure the well defined air right ownership is represented will allow all stakeholders to benefit. Often groups cannot be represented because they are fragmented and have little weight in conversations. By aggregating the air rights not only will we in SkyTrades add weight, we will be the reason highways are created in the skies, unlocking drones and Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) where the air rights owners want them and where the demand requires them.

The EU is attempting to create an environment that is conducive to various types of Urban Air Mobility. Taking into account multiple stakeholders. The owners of the air rights are missing from the conversation for now. As they, in my view are the most important part of the equation it is vital they are involved so the benefits flow in the right direction.

In the US regulation appears somewhat behind the EU in regards to UAM. Nevertheless the opportunity is as large if not larger and the highly attuned growth mindset in the US will, hopefully, kick into action. We no longer require road traffic to grow, we have enough road traffic and it’s causing problems of epic proportions to the way we live. In the US over the last 100 years there has been population growth of 4x and road traffic growth of 125X!

Luckily we don’t need the regulators to decide who owns the low altitude air space. The rights to that space is the landowners. The air rights owners do however need a way to benefit from these rights and make them useful in aggregate. What we need regulators to do is approve the flying machines and get out of the way.

The question has to be asked, with ever increasing traffic jams, rising pollution rates and the hollowing out of many cities due to terrible mismanaged of transportation and housing, why are we putting more cars on the roads?

If we are not careful, just like the Penny Farthing we will end up with strange contraptions in very badly designed cities that have their proverbial drive-train the wrong way around.

If we look up, not only will our perspective change but we can solve our transportation problems. Doing this we will grow our economies quickly, in more efficient and effective ways for all of us. To do this we are bringing air rights into our marketplace to enable highways in the sky to be built. jonathan@skytrades.io