GoFly, Author at GoFly Prize - Page 8 of 10 GoFly Prize

Congratulations to all our innovators and teams for completing Phase I of the GoFly challenge! Over 600 Innovators from over 30 countries across 6 continents have submitted their designs. We were impressed with the technical prowess and the creativity of a multitude of entries, and we have selected the 10 winners of Phase I of the GoFly Challenge.

Over the course of several weeks, our panel of 97 industry experts with over a millennium of combined industry experience carefully evaluated each individual aspect of every submission in accordance with the official Technical Guidelines. The pool of judges included numerous Chief Engineers, Flight Test Engineers, Senior Technical Fellows, Pilots, and Esteemed Academics from a collection of the world’s most innovative and prestigious aerospace companies and academia.

And now, after the rigorous judging process, GoFly is pleased to introduce to the world the 10 Winners of Phase I of the GoFly Challenge (in alphabetical order):

Team’s Device Description: ERA Aviabike is a tilt rotor aerial vehicle type that combines VTOL capabilities of helicopter with range and speed of fixed-wing aircraft.

Team Members: Vladimir Spinko (captain), Eldar Razroev, Ilya Golubovich, Adel Khaliullin, Alexander Remizov, Vitaly Grishanov, Andrew Ukhnevich, Fedor Zagumennov, Alexander Krasnov

Country of Origin: Latvia

Team’s Device Description: Students and faculty at Penn State University Aerospace Engineering designed Blue Sparrow to be scalable, robust, safe, and fun to fly.

Team Members: Jack Langelaan (Captain), Amy Pritchett, Mostafa Elghorab, Alberto Spagnoli, John Ciraulo, Jamil Wen, Zhouzhou Chen, Wei-Cheng Hsu, Eric Johnson

Country of Origin: United States

Team’s Device Description: HummingBuzz utilizes the fully electric, ducted coaxial rotor configuration, with the fuselage on top, in the shape of a motorcycle.

Team Members: Yuanxin Shen (captain), Brian Eberle, Alistair Sequeira, Daniel P. Schrage, Ashok Sylvester, Suzie Wang

Country of Origin: United States

Team’s Device Description: Vantage is a five-rotor airbike.

Team Members: Bruno Howard (captain), Pat Branch, Ryan Wallace, Sangeet Shah, Jakob Howard, Philipp Seeger, Nikhil Aggarwal, Karim Gharaibeh

Country of Origin: United Kingdom

Team’s Device Description: The Mamba is a hexcopter emphasizing safety, certifiability, and performance. Shrouded rotors and a tilting empennage are incorporated.

Team Members: Lauren Schumacher (captain), Dr. Ronald Barrett, Patrick McNamee, John Haug, Nicholas Werner, Joshua Mudd, Dalton Prins, Martin Mendoza, Ankur Patil

Country of Origin: United States

Team’s Device Description: The Pegasus is a Y6 tilt rotor with a wing and a hybrid powertrain with a cruise speed of 70 knots.

Team Members: Richard ‘Alex’ Smolen (captain)

Country of Origin: United States

Team’s Device Description: This device is a canard-wing configuration around a person in motorcycle-like orientation powered by two electric motors with ducted rotors. The aircraft makes a 90 degree transition from vertical take-off to horizontal cruise flight.

Team Members: Victor Sonneveld (captain), James Murdza, Quint Houwink, Ralph Krook, Luuk van der Linde, Thom van den Homberg, Rutger van Brouwershaven, Olivier Witteman

Country of Origin: Netherlands

Team’s Device Description: teTra 3 is not only efficient enough, but also stylish enough to meet commercial requirements.

Team Members: Tasuku Nakai (captain), Masaru Okada, Akihiro Mizutani, Koya Kuwamura, Kazunori Saito, Kenichi Kajitani, Tetsuya Matsuhisa, Yasuyuki Shimizu

Country of Origin: Japan

Team’s Device Description: Harmony is a high-TRL compact rotorcraft designed to minimize noise and maximize efficiency, safety, reliability, and flight experience.

Team Members: Moble Benedict (captain), David Coleman, Atanu Halder, Andrew Riha, Bochan Lee, Farid Saemi, Carl Runco, Vishaal Subramanian, Eric Greenwood, Vinod Lakshminarayan, Nima Ershad, Aswathi Sudhir, Hunter Denton, Adam Kellen, Bharath Govindrajan, Ananth Sridharan

Country of Origin: United States

Team’s Device Description: FlyKart 2 is a single-seat, open-cockpit, 10-rotor, ducted fan, electrically-powered, VTOL aircraft.

Team Members: Robert Bulaga (captain), Jose Fierro, Joshua Portlock

Country of Origin: United States

Please join us in celebrating the work of the Phase I Winners of the GoFly Challenge! Each winning Team will receive $20,000 for their efforts and innovation, as they continue on in their journey toward the Final Fly Off.

With the award of the the Phase I prizes, the Building Phase of GoFly is officially open. This is when teams get to test out designs, turn their ideas into reality, and begin their builds to make people fly! And remember: You don’t need to win a Phase I prize, or to have participated in Phase I, in order to participate and win in Phase II.

Additionally, as Teams begin the Phase II Building, GoFly is proud to support all our innovators every step of the way. To that end, GoFly has partnered with industry leaders to provide access to a myriad of incredibly valuable benefits throughout the entire competition. All Teams who participate in the Phase II Building Phase and who continue to remain active competitors will have access to hundreds of thousands of dollars in mentoring, software, products, services, media, and discounts, including but not limited to our GoFly In-Kind sponsor program. You can find more information on that program here.

All of these benefits are available to all Teams who complete the Phase II application and are officially accepted as a Phase II Team by GoFly. To become an official Phase II Team, innovators must complete the Phase II Agreements, which can be started by contacting phase2@goflyprize.com with: 1) name, 2) team name, 3) list of team members, and 4) country. Registered teams gain access to these benefits in return for completing the Master Team Agreement documents and agreeing to provide GoFly with the opportunity to take a small equity stake in the resulting company. In the meantime, if you have not already done so, please be sure to sign the Interim Agreement, which allows you to keep working on your design while you prepare the Phase II documents.

We can’t wait to see what you all create!

Ready. Set. GoFly!

Editor’s Note: Over the next two years, we’ll be hosting a series of GoFly Master Lectures where industry experts share advice, insights, and answer questions from anyone interested in participating in the GoFly Prize.

For the latest in our series of “Master Lectures,” we welcome Dr. Shane Arnott, director of Boeing Phantom Works International and senior technical fellow at Boeing Defense, Space & Security. As Director of Boeing Phantom Works International, Dr. Shane Arnott is responsible for the Phantom Works international presence in Australia, the United Kingdom, Korea, India, and Saudi Arabia. The Phantom Works mission is to engage customers to understand their needs, and the development of resulting prototypes of new products and systems. Arnott is a Senior Technical Fellow with Boeing, recognised as being within the top 0.1 per cent of Boeing engineers, and is the international spokesperson for the fellowship. Arnott has been with the company since 1997. He holds a Bachelor of Engineering with Honours (First Class) and a PhD in Systems Engineering.

In this session, he lectures about modeling and simulation, and holds a question-and-answer session. If you have follow-up questions, check out current discussions on the GoFly forum or start your own thread!

Congratulations to all our innovators and teams for completing Phase I of the GoFly challenge! Over 600 Innovators from 33 countries across 6 continents have submitted their designs. We are in the midst of reviewing Phase I submissions and continue to be impressed by the technical prowess and enthusiasm to change the world displayed by each Team. As a reminder, on June 14th, GoFly will award $20,000 to each of the top 10 submissions.

With Phase I submissions in, we are thrilled to officially launch Phase II of GoFly. Phase II launches the Building Phase of the competition. This is when teams get to test out designs, turn their ideas into reality, and begin their builds to make people fly!

And remember: You don’t need to win a Phase I prize, or to have participated in Phase I, in order to participate and win in Phase II.

As Teams begin the Phase II Building Phase, GoFly is proud to support all our innovators every step of the way. To that end, GoFly has partnered with industry leaders to provide access to a myriad of incredibly valuable benefits throughout the entire competition. All Teams who participate in the Phase II Building Phase and who continue to remain active competitors will have access to hundreds of thousands of dollars in mentoring, software, products, services, media, and discounts, including but not limited to our GoFly In-Kind Sponsor program.

Global Aerospace: Insurance

Global Aerospace is a leading provider of aerospace insurance with a worldwide portfolio of clients who are engaged in every aspect of the aviation and space industries. Known for its innovative approach to providing insurance solutions for the industry, the company’s underwriting is backed by a pool of high quality insurance companies representing some of the most respected names in the business. Global Aerospace will provide all eligible Phase II and III GoFly Teams with $1,000,000 of Aircraft Liability insurance for a flat rate of $1,500. (*eligibility dependent on team’s geographical jurisdiction)

BRS Aerospace: Ballistic Recovery Systems Safety Consultations

BRS will provide free Ballistic Recovery Systems Safety consultations to all Phase II Teams on designing the Team’s safety mechanism. BRS CEO and GoFly Master Boris Popov will also personally provide the consultation for each Team. All Phase III Teams will be provided with a Safety System Assessment Report at no charge and will have the opportunity to purchase a BRS system at a 20% discount.

OnShape: CAD Software

The modern CAD system offers advanced modeling tools and design data management in a secure cloud workspace that is accessible on any device and never loses data. Onshape will be providing its Professional Level CAD software and technical support to all registered Phase II GoFly Teams. When additional help is needed, all Teams have access to Onshape technical support, online classes and tutorials

TotalSim US: CFD Simulation Software

TotalSim US’s Computational Fluid Dynamics allows users to simulate test conditions and run robust analyses on build designs, all through cutting edge CFD technologies. All Phase II GoFly Teams will have access to TotalSim US’s CFD software, as well as access to simulation tokens.

Cases by Source: Exclusive Custom Case Sponsors

Cases By Source designs and manufactures protective packaging to protect some of the world’s finest and valuable instruments and equipment. All Teams that make it to Phase III will be supplied with a free Cases by Source custom case and custom foam insert in order to help you transport your Personal Flying Devices to the Final Fly Off. The design process begins in Phase II when each Team is supplied with a free custom case rendering and will have the ability to work directly with Cases By Source designers on their custom cases.

Fibre Glast: Special Composite Material Supplier

Fibre Glast Developments specializes in the distribution of carbon fiber, fiberglass, Kevlar, resins, vacuum bagging materials, pumps and equipment, additives, gel coats and other supplies necessary to create lightweight, durable aircraft. Fibre Glast will be providing a 20% discount on all products sold on their websites for all registered and participating Phase II GoFly Teams.

RockWest Composites: Special Composite Provider

Rock West Composites sells carbon fiber tubes, plates, rods, shapes, connectors, and a whole host of composite material needs that will be essential in the build phase for our competitors. Rock West will provide a 15% discount on all goods sold on the Rock West websites to all registered and participating GoFly Phase II Teams.

Firgelli Automations: Preferred Actuator Sponsor

Firgelli Automations is a global provider for TV Lifts, Linear Actuators and many other products to support a huge range of industries and applications. The Top 10 Phase I Teams who continue onto Phase II will be provided with one free Firgelli Automations actuator at no cost or charge to the Teams. In addition, all Phase II Teams will receive 30% off the regular price of all items on the Firgelli website for so long as such Team is registered and participating in the GoFly Prize.

Master Lectures

GoFly provides free access to Master Lectures and Q&A with the luminaries of aerospace design, engineering, finance, law, and marketing. Teams have the opportunity to engage in discussions with the masters of aviation and business in global webinars. Through the Master Lectures, Teams can learn from DARPA chiefs, NASA gurus, Boeing Senior Technical Fellows, and the VCs who are helping to shape the future. The full list of Masters and their bios can be found here.

One-on-One Assistance From GoFly Mentors

All active Phase II Teams have access to the GoFly Mentor program, which matches innovators directly with Mentors in areas such as technology, design, fundraising, or marketing. Participating teams can request to be paired with a mentor through this form.

Venture Capital Introductions and Funding Mentors

GoFly will provide active Phase II Teams with introductions to and mentoring from experts in venture capital and fundraising. GoFly will provide free programming on developing your funding deck, creating a list of active aerospace financers, taking that first pitch meeting, the funding process, and traditional deal terms.

KickStarter: Mentoring and Curated Pages

GoFly Phase II Teams wishing to raise funds through a Kickstarter campaign can access free Mentoring from Kickstarter Technology Leads. All GoFly Teams raising funds through Kickstarter will be featured on a GoFly Kickstarter Curated Page.

Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association: Free 6-Month Membership

Since 1939, AOPA has protected the freedom to fly by promoting an environment that gives people of all ages the opportunity to enjoy aviation and all it has to offer. AOPA is providing all Phase II Teams with a free 6-month Flight Training membership. AOPA will provide Phase 1 winners with an additional 6-month members, and all Phase II and Phase III winners with a 1-Year Intro Membership.

Experimental Aircraft Association: Discounted Membership

EAA embodies The Spirit of Aviation through the world’s most engaged community of aviation enthusiasts. All GoFly Phase II Teams will receive discounted membership in the Experimental Aircraft Association.

Flight Safety Foundation: Discounted Membership

The Flight Safety Foundation is an international non-profit organization chartered to provide impartial, independent, expert safety guidance and resources for the aviation and aerospace industry. The Flight Safety Foundation will be providing an 85% discount for membership to all registered and participating Phase II competitors, as well as discounts to its Global Aviation Safety Conferences and Seminars.

All of these benefits are available to all Teams who complete the Phase II application and are officially accepted as a Phase II Team by GoFly. To become an official Phase II Team, innovators must complete the Phase II Agreements, which can be started by contacting phase2@goflyprize.com with: 1) name, 2) team name, 3) list of team members, and 4) country. Registered teams gain access to these benefits in return for completing the Master Team Agreement documents and agreeing to provide GoFly with the opportunity to take a small equity stake in the resulting company. In the meantime, if you have not already done so, please be sure to sign the Interim Agreement, which allows you to keep working on your design while you prepare the Phase II documents.

We can’t wait to see what you all create!

Ready. Set. GoFly!

For the latest in our series of “Master Lectures,” we welcome Helen Grenier, founder of CyPhy Works, a company that builds flying robots for military and industrial applications. In 1990, she co-founded iRobot Corporation and served as President and Chairman until 2008. iRobot Corporation is the most successful mobile robot company in the world with more than 15 million Roomba™ vacuuming robots delivered to date. Recently Endeavor Robotics was spun out of iRobot to focus on the military market with the PackBot™ and SUGV™ tactical mobile robots.

In this session, she lectures about robotics and holds a question-and-answer session. If you have follow-up questions, check out current discussions on the GoFly forum or start your own thread!

Unmanned aerial vehicles, also known as drones, have captured the imagination of hobbyists for decades. Today, new generations of pilots and enthusiasts are reaping the advances in technology that have made it possible for nearly anyone to own a drone.

To keep up with interest and drone demand, the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association (AOPA), a GoFly Prize partner, is creating new ways to educate and prepare pilots for flight, including the development of a curriculum for high school students interested in pursuing careers in aviation.

In the following Q&A, AOPA’s senior director of UAS programs Kathleen “Kat” Swain discusses the role drones will play in the future of personal flight, and how the definition of the word “pilot” is changing.

The following is an edited transcript of the discussion.

GoFly: Compared to 15 years ago, has the definition of “pilot” changed?

Swain: Yes, by leaps and bounds. I get excited when I hear drone operators, who have no private pilot certificates, refer to themselves as pilots. That puts a smile on my face because that’s exactly what they are. They’re flying a mission, they’re doing a job, they’re finding their passion in the skies, just like professional pilots do when flying manned or unmanned aircrafts.

I’m excited that the technology has expanded and that the regulatory community has allowed that innovation to flourish and not get stifled.

GoFly: AOPA provides a high school curriculum for aspiring pilots. Why is that important?

Swain: Even before high school, I knew I wanted to be a pilot, but trying to find the resources I needed was a bit of a struggle. Thankfully, I was a very headstrong young lady and I didn’t let anybody tell me ‘no.’ Even when people did tell me ‘no,’ I just found a way around it, working really hard to get to where I am today. But a lot of people don’t have the financial resources or the confidence to do it on their own. That’s why AOPA is stepping up to say ‘We see what’s lacking in this space. We know aviation and how to teach it.’

With our high school curriculum, students can get their foot in the door early, so that they don’t have to wait until they get to college or even after college to pursue their passion for flight. I’m seeing a lot of young kids come forward and say, ‘I want this career and I’m passionate about it. I see the different ways that being a pilot can improve the world, and I want to be a part of that.’

GoFly: What is your hope for the future of piloting?

Swain: Our main mission at AOPA is to give you the freedom to fly. I don’t see commercial flight and remote flight as mutually exclusive. We want the freedom to fly to exist in both worlds. There’s plenty of airspace for all of us to fly, enjoy our flight and fulfill our mission. I’m excited to see what the future holds in both arenas.

GoFly: What’s the best part about being a flight instructor?

Swain: As a flight instructor, I have always found joy when I take somebody up in the airplane for the very first time and give them their first flight. It gets very quiet sometimes and I’ll look over at them and they have a big smile plastered on their face. That to me is the ultimate joy— I’ve passed along something that I love very deeply and shared it with them. That’s one of the greatest things that I could ever give back to the aviation community.

GoFly: How will drones play a role in the future of personal flight?

Swain: There’s exciting potential. It’s another approach to passenger transport. You can see the amount of work, effort, time and money that’s being placed into companies that are revolutionizing transportation. Especially here in the United States, getting from point A to point B to point C takes a long time, whether it’s on the highway or via traditional air travel. If we can make something more efficient, safe and cost effective, I’m all for it.

For the latest in our series of “Master Lectures,” we welcome Dr. Marilyn Smith, professor at the Daniel Guggenheim School of Aerospace Engineering and associate director at the Vertical Lift Research Center of Excellence.

Smith performs research in the areas of non-linear computational aeroelasticity (using CFD) and the integrated multidisciplinary areas of unsteady aerodynamics and acoustic/fluid/structure interactions across rotating and fixed wing vehicles and systems. Her recent research also includes award-winning development of nonlinear reduced-order models for design and modeling and simulation. Her research sponsors include all branches of the DoD, NASA, DoE, ARO, ONR, and NSF, as well as industry.

In her lecture, Smith provides insight on rotary-wing aerodynamics analysis and answers questions about the topic. If you have follow-up questions, check out current discussions on the GoFly forum or start your own thread!

For the latest in our series of “Master Lectures,” we welcome Drs. Mark Yim, Bruce Kothmann, and Vijay Kuma, members of the University of Pennsylvania’s Department of Mechanical Engineering and Applied Mechanics.

Dr. Mark Yim is a Professor in the Mechanical Engineering and Applied Mechanics Department at the University of Pennsylvania. His group designs and builds small flying robots, self-assembling structures, modular self-reconfigurable robots. Recently, his work has followed a theme of simplicity and low cost. His other research interests include product design, reactive art and architecture, origami, snake locomotion, urban search and rescue and mobile manipulation.

Dr. Bruce Kothmann is a Senior Lecturer in Mechanical Engineering and Applied Mechanics at the University of Pennsylvania’s School of Engineering and Applied Science. He received the 2012 Provost’s Award for Teaching Excellence. He is an avid user of laboratory and interactive teaching spaces.

Dr. Vijay Kumar is the Nemirovsky Family Dean of Penn Engineering at the University of Pennsylvania’s Departments of Mechanical Engineering and Applied Mechanics, Computer and Information Science, and Electrical and Systems Engineering. His group works on creating autonomous ground and aerial robots, designing bio-inspired algorithms for collective behaviors, and on robot swarms. Kumar is a fellow of ASME and IEEE and a member of the National Academy of Engineering.

In this Master Lecture, the three discuss ways to think outside the box in regards to novel rotor/vehicle technologies, control for near-hover configurations and handling qualities, and the role of autonomy in human controlled flight.

If you have follow-up questions, check out current discussions on the GoFly forum or start your own thread!

For the latest in our series of “Master Lectures,” we welcome Jim Murray, a Partner at PJT Partners since August of 2014. Having worked in the aviation industry for the past two decades, Murray has established durable relationships with senior executives at wireless carriers, mobile device manufacturers, satellite communications ventures, aerospace and automotive primes, remote sensing providers, media conglomerates, and major Internet companies in the United States, Europe, and Asia. Murray has built a broad network of contacts in the venture capital community that fuels ongoing technology and business model innovation in these industries. Over the course of his career, he has accumulated extensive public and private capital markets experience, helping clients raise over $150Bn in investment grade and non-investment grade bank debt, bond, and equity capital. He has also advised on the successful IPOs of numerous TMT companies on the NYSE, NASDAQ, and LSE. Today, he frequently consults with regulators and lobbyists in Washington who influence the evolution of mobile technology.

Watch his Master Lecture above, and check out our discussions on the GoFly forum or start your own thread!

Congratulations to all our innovators and teams for your submissions in Phase I of the GoFly challenge! Over 600 Innovators from over 30 countries across 6 continents have submitted their designs. Your technical prowess and enthusiasm to change the world are evident in your entries, which our team looks forward to reviewing in greater detail in the coming weeks. This exciting moment marks the first step in our collective mission to revolutionize flight, transportation, and the world as we know it!

On June 12th, GoFly will announce the Phase I winners and award $20,000 to each of the top 10 submissions.

In the meantime, there are two important points to note:

1. You do NOT need to win a Phase I prize in order to continue on to Phase II. While we are looking forward to celebrating these Phase I winning Teams, all innovators (whether they won a Phase I prize or not) are encouraged to continue competing throughout the entire competition. The Final Fly Off winners can still come from anywhere, and do not need to have won a previous round’s prize in order to win the Grand Prize. And remember, there are still almost $2,000,0000 in prizes available in Phase II and III.

2. All Innovators interested in continuing to participate in the GoFly Prize should accept the Interim Agreement. Signing this agreement allows you to keep working on your design while you prepare the Phase II documents, which will be available in early May and may take teams additional time to complete. And if this Interim Agreement looks familiar to you, it should! It is an update of the Phase I Agreement that you already signed. To continue participating as part of GoFly in anticipation of Phase II, please accept the agreement on the GoFly Prize site.

In May, we will be officially launching Phase II of GoFly: The Building Phase. This is when teams get to test out designs, turn their ideas into reality, and begin building their prototypes to make people fly! We will be sharing additional information about this in the coming weeks, alongside some very exciting news around access to valuable software, products, services, and experts that all participating teams will have access to throughout the entire competition.

Stay tuned for more updates!

Ready. Set. GoFly!

For the latest in our series of “Master Lectures,” we welcome Bruce Kay, a former Sikorsky Tech Fellow for Air Vehicle design. Kay was responsible for changing the paradigm that helicopter airframes had to be metal. He conducted requisite R&D and then become Chief Engineer for the world’s first composite airframe helicopter, the Sikorsky S-75 (ACAP). Subsequently, he was appointed Chief of Design for the Comanche helicopter, and managed several IPTs. Following first flight, he returned to research and managed Sikorsky’s advanced airframe R&D. This included pioneering applications for advanced design concepts, analysis, producibility, and software simulation tools. has Kay received numerous recognition awards from AHS, the Army, and NASA.

Watch the full lecture above to hear Kay share insights on design and project management gleaned from work on over a dozen aircraft design projects in over five decades.

If you have follow-up questions, check out current discussions on the GoFly forum or start your own thread!