Latest / Founder Talk with Alex Sheridan / Drone Expert on Building a Tech Company, UAPs, and Whether We’re Alone

Transcript

Drone Expert on Building a Tech Company, UAPs, and Whether We’re Alone · Founder Talk with Alex Sheridan

0:00
Ryan Walsh Cheers brother. Glad to have you out.
0:02
This is Round 2. For anyone that doesn't know, we
0:04
had an episode a few months ago now that aired, Go look it up.
0:09
It's a good one too. And I'll just preface it while
0:11
saying if you're if you're not into drones and the future of
0:15
where the world's going and maybe a little bit of alien
0:17
spaceship we're going to get into, then you might not
0:20
appreciate this episode. But if that stuff is interesting
0:22
to you, we might go down a few rabbit holes today.
0:25
So we'll see. So yeah, man, excited to have
0:28
you back here. I know you were in Hong Kong.
0:30
Yep, for a little while. I'd be curious to see you're
0:32
just kind of what, what are you guys up to?
0:33
What were you doing in Hong Kong and what's going on?
0:36
Yeah, no, I appreciate you having me.
0:39
Seems like the world gets crazier and crazier every time I
0:42
step away right now. We were in Hong Kong.
0:46
I was at ELMAC, the Asian Logistics Aviation Maritime
0:52
Conference. Great conference in Hong Kong
0:58
with just phenomenal, just top to bottom, one of the best
1:04
conferences I've attended. Yeah, I think a lot of people
1:08
who are visiting Asia are coming back and realizing how much
1:13
further along that part of the world is.
1:15
Really. Yeah, How so?
1:16
I just in so many aspects and I believe Japan, Korea, China,
1:25
Hong Kong, I mean just that whole side of Asia has really
1:30
moved at a much quicker pace. And I don't know, I mean you
1:34
just it's hard to describe other than you see it in the
1:37
infrastructure, you see it in the bathrooms, you see it in
1:41
just the streets. Trains the.
1:43
Everything, it's just you can tell.
1:46
It's almost like you live in the 2000s.
1:51
Right. And you're.
1:52
Like, oh, this is the future, You know, exactly.
1:55
It's, it's further along and it's, it's hard to describe how,
2:03
how nuanced it just kind of hits you when you get there.
2:07
Which I think is interesting because you people, a lot of
2:09
people even here but around the world think like America is the
2:13
most advanced and most technological and most
2:16
innovative. And I think in certain ways we
2:17
are. But in other ways you go to the
2:19
other countries and you're like, wow, why don't we have this?
2:22
You know, we have Amtrak dude, which is like just an old train
2:26
that moves like 60 something mph and they have these lightning
2:28
freaking like. It's like anything else, right?
2:31
It's you invest your time and resources and money where you
2:36
want to see the change. Yeah.
2:37
And so they put a lot of effort and resources into, you know,
2:41
the, the, those types of things, right?
2:44
There's, there's cities, the, the trains, the just travel
2:48
everything. It's it's just very sometimes
2:53
makes you feel as an American like man, we, we got some areas
2:55
to we can improve. Yeah, for sure.
2:58
So what was going on in Hong Kong then?
3:00
I know the conference, but like what?
3:01
What was it all about? So it was going over really just
3:06
all kinds of logistic developments, bringing together
3:09
a lot of, you know, just leaders in each of the spaces.
3:13
But they really had a focus on drones at this conference.
3:17
And it seems like, you know, wherever you look, drones are
3:21
more and more a part of that conversation.
3:23
And so they really just put a whole effort into bringing a lot
3:28
of just drone CEOs and, you know, different people that have
3:33
discussions. And we had some great panels.
3:37
I was really impressed with the conversations that were had and
3:40
the discussions that were going on.
3:43
So it was just a really good conference overall.
3:45
I saw cargo drones are going to be the future of air logistics.
3:49
Yeah, that was the panel I was on.
3:52
What? Does that mean?
3:53
So, you know, they were really focused on where drones are
3:57
going and, and how drones are actually going to be delivering
4:02
things for everyday use in the very near future.
4:07
In China, for instance. It's already been happening for
4:10
7-8 years now. Really.
4:11
Yeah, yeah. They're way behind or way ahead
4:13
of us on drones too, aren't they?
4:14
Way. That's what I thought.
4:16
So I, well, from what I've heard, I'm an expert, but I
4:18
heard that Biden and the policies and previous
4:21
administration were kind of like not super supportive of drones.
4:24
Is that right or? No, it all.
4:25
It goes all the way back to the previous trouble administration.
4:27
Yeah, 2014 is really kind of when the whole world kind of
4:34
stood still for the drone industry for a decade.
4:36
Now why would that be? I think what was going on in the
4:41
time was the FAA and the government was worried that if
4:46
you have a bunch of people just throwing drones in the air,
4:49
right, you're going to have them colliding with aircraft and, you
4:51
know, doing the wrong things. And, you know, we did have some
4:55
of that over the years, but I don't think you're going to stop
4:58
any of that, right? Like you got to have systems to
5:00
counteract that. And so they threw up more or
5:04
less blanket embargo where you had to have line of sight of
5:08
your drone, right? And so that pretty much killed
5:10
9999 1/2% of all the business cases for for drones,
5:16
particularly delivery, whereas China was much more embracing of
5:20
it. So you're just, you're seeing
5:23
kind of the fruits of seven years, eight years of policy
5:28
going in a different direction. And now it's they're way ahead.
5:33
So it's like you kind of got to break shit to innovate too a
5:35
little bit, you know? I mean, I mean, you don't want
5:37
to blow the doors off the safety procedure, but you kind of got
5:40
to take some risk and have some things happen to be able to
5:43
innovate. Otherwise you just not get like
5:44
cars crashed a lot when they first started driving cars and
5:48
shit happened right? I always laugh, we would have
5:51
the first drone flights and people be like, you know, oh,
5:53
this isn't that impressive. And, and compared to what drones
5:57
are doing now, it it wasn't. But you look at the first cars
6:00
and they were going 2 miles an hour and you had to have a guy
6:02
out front with a flag and he had to make sure that nobody was in
6:06
your way. Oh, wow.
6:07
Yeah. So like you look at that all the
6:10
way to F1, right. And all the the progress that
6:13
has happened in the last 100 years in cars, right?
6:15
I mean, we're going to see that exponentially bigger.
6:20
I think what's going to happen, truth be told, is a lot of the
6:24
AI bubble that, you know, we might see a few pops or I guess
6:28
cracks, whatever. And I think a lot of that money
6:32
and focus is going to shift into drones and robotics in this next
6:36
year. I think you're right.
6:37
Robotics, I've been seeing some wild things come out with that.
6:40
Some videos on just like the robotics now they're like
6:42
running back and forth. It's kind of scary, man.
6:45
It's kind of crazy, but yeah. It's Terminator.
6:49
It is, it is. And so I was listening to Joe
6:52
Rogan. I interviewed NVIDIA CEO, the
6:55
Jensen guy and they were talking about what really is being
6:58
conscious. It's an interesting conversation
7:01
because you can AI right now could appear conscious, but is
7:04
it really conscious, you know? I don't think we have anything
7:07
close to AI, to be honest with you.
7:09
I think we have very, very glorified predictive text
7:12
models. In in your mind, what is
7:15
considered AI? Then what would be?
7:17
Not necessarily true conscience or sentience, but you know,
7:21
you're you're at least fooling people on the tests, right?
7:26
I mean, it's it's an awareness of your general surroundings and
7:30
kind of your place in it and having the ability to kind of
7:35
understand the capabilities you have to manipulate the world
7:38
around you, right, to some extent.
7:42
And so if we're having AI that is genuinely able to solve
7:47
problems even, and I know we see it a little bit in some of the
7:52
black box syndrome we have with some of the current Lol models.
7:55
But even this agentic AI that they call it, I don't
8:00
necessarily think it is the same level of problem solving and
8:06
cognizance that true AI would have, right?
8:10
Like we're seeing a lot of the limitations and kind of where
8:17
these models are kind of hitting the wall.
8:21
And I don't think it's the same places you would have AGI
8:24
hitting a wall. If anything, that's where AGI
8:26
would flourish in a lot of ways. Yeah, kind of a lot of it's just
8:30
like taking other information, spewing it back to you the best
8:33
way that it knows how to do right.
8:34
It's not actually like thinking and then giving you an answer.
8:37
It's kind of pulling from a bunch of data sets and language
8:40
models, obviously, but right, yeah.
8:42
So is is, does it seem like the United States is back on the
8:44
drone train then are we, are we better with regulations now to
8:48
try and keep like catch up? We're making a lot of progress
8:51
and it seems like the last year there's been a lot of progress
8:54
in the right direction on drones and on patents.
8:59
So patents have been in kind of winter for the last decade as
9:04
well, thanks to the America Invents Act.
9:07
So that was passed what 2011 I believe.
9:11
And so that that has made it very not inventor friendly out
9:18
there. And so we're seeing a lot of
9:22
turns on that. And the reason that matters is
9:24
when you have patents that you know, inventors which turn into
9:28
startups and those getting invested and funded and turn
9:33
into your bigger companies and eventually your Unicorn.
9:35
So I mean, the patents are what protect those resources in the
9:41
early days being invested, right?
9:43
And so it's really important for innovation to have a good patent
9:49
system. And so the patents being more
9:52
protectable these days is leading to a better environment,
9:57
especially because drones are very hardware driven.
10:01
And so that along with some of the changes executive orders
10:05
we're seeing in in Pentagon looking to spend, you know,
10:09
crazy amount of billion. I think Florida just announced
10:12
the other day they want to spend 4 billion on drone systems,
10:15
right? And so we're seeing that push
10:19
kind of towards that direction. So yeah, I think it's exactly
10:23
kind of where this whole thing goes.
10:26
So when people say China has much better drone technology
10:29
than the USA does, do they mean civilian or military or both?
10:34
Both. Damn, we got that far behind a
10:36
military. Like I would think that would be
10:37
one place that you would keep up and you could test things under
10:40
like isolated scenarios. So it would be like civilians
10:43
just flying shit in the air. I would.
10:44
How would that not be a number one priority or a top priority?
10:47
Because drones are just basically aircrafts in the sky
10:50
now we've launched missiles, we do attacks like that would be
10:52
the one thing you'd really want. I was talking to a lot of you.
10:55
You've been in the military just to, just to clarify the army,
10:58
right? Yeah, I was talking to a lot of
11:00
my contacts, you know, higher up in, in the brass over in the
11:04
military. And I kept saying, you know,
11:07
this 2018-2019 time frame, you know, hey, this is this is the
11:11
future of warfare. They kept saying you're crazy,
11:13
you're crazy. And they said, I would tell them
11:15
like, you know, you have this mindset like IBM had in, you
11:21
know, the old days with computers, right?
11:23
They thought bigger, bigger, bigger, more concentrated,
11:26
right, bigger global Hawks and things like that, right?
11:29
And I, I kept telling them like, no, it's when you, you know,
11:32
decentralize and, and democratize this technology a
11:36
lot like phones or computers, that's when the shift really
11:39
happens. And and so when the battlefield
11:41
gets to a point where you have, you know, drones making these
11:45
types of, you know, borderline AGI decisions, the battlefield
11:49
changes tremendously. And we saw with Ukraine what
11:52
that looks like. And so.
11:54
Wasn't that kind of the first big war of like drone technology
11:57
where it really emerged right? You heard about it.
12:00
Well, I mean, prior to that, all you saw was, you know, Predators
12:03
and Reapers taking out, you know, a wedding in Yemen, right?
12:07
And it was ridiculous asymmetric warfare.
12:10
And so now Ukraine was the first near peer type of conflict
12:16
where, yeah, you have drones really making the shift.
12:19
And I think those first days when you have a 15 year old kid
12:23
using $300 in drone parts to take out a $3 billion tank
12:26
column, it's like, oh, there's something here, right?
12:30
And even some of the people I've been talking to lately, they
12:33
said that tactics have completely changed in the last
12:37
18 months. I'm sure like if you've been out
12:40
of the front lines for the last 18 months, whatever you learned
12:43
is no good anymore. Like the the battlefield has
12:46
changed so much. That's so.
12:48
True man. So it's, yeah, it's kind of
12:50
rewriting doctrine as we speak. And, and so I think, yes, drones
12:54
are going to absolutely be the future of not just warfare, but
12:58
almost everything, right? Exactly.
13:00
Because now you kind of got to look up, you know, it's not.
13:03
Just it's BI. Just look up.
13:05
Oh yeah, even. Yeah, exactly.
13:06
And then you get humanoid robotics that are coming where
13:08
it's like, we're not going to have humans in the battlefield
13:12
for that. Much I think we will.
13:14
You think we'll have humans in the battlefield?
13:15
Why wouldn't we have humanoid robotics?
13:17
Because those are going to be near pier.
13:19
There's only so many countries that have the capability of
13:22
building humanoids right? If you have China going after
13:27
one of their, although they're not very, you know, kind of
13:31
expansionist, let's say the US uses some of those figure robots
13:37
to go and take out a, you know, terrorist cell in Yemen, right?
13:42
Like, I think there's going to be a lot more of US deploying it
13:48
against human targets in the beginning, right?
13:52
And so it's it's not going to be US against China with two armies
13:56
of. No because I don't think armies
13:58
are even. I mean, if we went to war with
14:00
China, would it even come down to like 2 battlefields of like,
14:04
maybe it's like urban combat or something, or more like, but it
14:07
seems like it'd almost be fought in the air or by sea.
14:10
Or like, you wouldn't just line up like they're also the
14:13
soldiers, like they're going to go fight each other, right?
14:16
They're already fighting it in a lot of ways, right?
14:18
I think, I think the next war is going to be so multi
14:22
dimensional. It's right.
14:24
It's going to be, you know, we're seeing it cyber and
14:27
economic in space. There's so many domains to this.
14:31
And So what we would consider a strategic target may be very
14:36
different in the next war. Right.
14:38
It's going to be freaking wild, man.
14:40
We will be. What are you most excited about
14:42
when it comes to drones? So I think, you know, truth be
14:47
told, just the the future of, you know, being able to press my
14:53
button on my phone and whatever I want is right where I am,
14:58
right? I mean, it's going to open up a
15:01
level of convenience and to, you know, our day-to-day right now,
15:06
your mind gets spinning right. But you know, to our day-to-day
15:09
that that could open a lot of doors.
15:11
But to people who live in, you know, more challenging
15:16
environment, that changes the entire outcome for them, right?
15:21
It gives them opportunity and and applications to hope that
15:25
they didn't have before, right? So now if I, if I don't, you
15:30
know, have to worry about going and getting groceries or having
15:35
to pick up food or whatever it may be getting my medicine,
15:38
right? Like that's where I see the
15:40
biggest, the biggest change. But where I'm I'm a little
15:46
nervous is we're seeing a huge uptick in adoption by police
15:50
departments. It's called drone as a first
15:53
responder and some of the ways that these departments have
15:59
shown that they're using this technology is is got me looking
16:04
very closely at it. What do you mean?
16:09
The police have not always been ones to respect civil rights or,
16:16
you know, kind of people's rights and then kind of build
16:21
policy around that right, like tends to be push that boundary
16:26
as far as they can. And then where does the lawsuit
16:30
start and kind of work your way back.
16:32
And then so drones are obviously a massive tool.
16:39
They have implications to change so many things and we're seeing
16:42
it in the departments that have adopted it already.
16:46
When you when you said the when you said the drone, it can bring
16:48
me anything, My mind thought just quickly went to like I
16:51
forgot my phone at home or something and I just you know, I
16:55
signal it and boop it, fix it. But then you need somebody to
16:57
like either put it in the drone or like grab it.
17:00
Maybe that's a humanoid robotic or some type of device, but
17:03
they'd be kind of wow, just to like call something to you.
17:06
I don't know, you know, I mean, it just seems like it's a matter
17:09
of not if, but when. They're not.
17:11
That's it. Yeah, when do you think humanoid
17:14
robotics will be in people's houses like you or I might
17:17
Legit. Thing to cost thing like
17:19
anything else and you know you. Think it's five years, 10 years,
17:23
Somewhat common. These figures that what Brad
17:26
Adcock's making are really impressive to me.
17:30
Those are the ones I'm most impressed by so far and.
17:33
Why those over Elons? I mean, Elons, I think are just
17:37
like anything else. Elon does look at me, I'm in the
17:40
game, right? But he's not, he's not leading
17:43
in any of the areas short of maybe SpaceX, right?
17:47
Just 'cause you know you don't. Think he LED with the EVs
17:49
though. I mean, no, I think.
17:52
Not anymore. You think?
17:53
Or. I think there's especially
17:56
China, like China. If you're talking global, I
17:59
guess, yeah, he's getting. Smoked, yeah, but yeah, no, it's
18:04
it's. Man, China's really just doing
18:07
it. They really are just.
18:09
Kind of ironic. So it's like you always think of
18:11
their country as like communists and like not having the freedom
18:15
of entrepreneurship and but they're somehow whether it's
18:18
right or wrong how they're going about it or you disagree or
18:21
agree or somehow getting it done technology wise.
18:25
Yeah, I mean they are. And I think it's just got a lot
18:27
to do with them putting the focus and prioritization and
18:31
rebuilding, you know, their society, their infrastructure,
18:35
but also their population, right?
18:37
They, they put a lot of their efforts into math and STEM and
18:41
things that's. True, that's a good point.
18:43
If you look at the version of TikTok that Chinese kids look at
18:47
versus the version the US kids look at, it's wild.
18:50
But that's that word we're talking about, right?
18:53
Like they're fighting war on and every domain.
18:57
Yeah, you know, like why did they let fentanyl and precursor
19:01
chemicals over? Like, you know, the IT all plays
19:06
into a bigger picture and and so I think that.
19:10
We kind of already are at war. Right.
19:11
Like we've been about it. We've been at war.
19:14
That's interesting. Yeah.
19:16
So back to my question, how many years do you think, if you had
19:19
to guess before humanoid robotics are in people's houses
19:22
and it's a common thing I. Think in the next couple of
19:24
years, to be honest, it goes down to economics again.
19:28
And what I fear is going to happen is it's going to be the
19:32
haves and have nots and right, imagine, imagine if you have
19:39
something like the feudal South, right, with this, right?
19:44
You have these people, mega rich that can afford humanoid
19:49
robotics to work fields to work in factories to do this, that
19:53
and the other. And it's property, right?
19:56
Like no question, right. And it's going to be many years
19:59
and a long time before AI has a point to where they're
20:03
representing themselves in court for their own agency.
20:06
That would be kind of wild if we felt.
20:08
Coming, but you're going to have a world where you know the the
20:14
haves are able to afford the $20,000 a piece or what does
20:19
Elon say he's going to have these out for, right?
20:21
I'd be shocked if they're that low.
20:22
That's, you know, the numbers getting thrown out, right?
20:26
But we have Elon's, I think he said 20,000 a piece is what he's
20:31
aiming for. Maybe somebody else that might
20:34
be wrong, but you know, 100 grand, I've got a little squad
20:40
of those guys and you know, what do you need done?
20:43
And so it opens up a crazy world.
20:46
But I think you are going to have people that build these
20:49
robotic armies, that work their factories, work their field,
20:54
work, their whatever, you know? Wow.
20:57
It is kind of wild when you think about it.
20:58
These things are going to be freaking everywhere.
21:02
I mean, eventually, yeah. Yeah, because if you had
21:05
humanoid robotic right here and let's just say I forgot my phone
21:08
at home, I might just tell the hey Roger robotic, go back home
21:12
and go get it. I don't think maybe they need
21:15
to. Yeah, the drones there.
21:17
You'd just tell him and he would, you know, organize all of
21:21
it through the cloud or through the Internet.
21:22
That's right, because he's, I mean, yeah, he would.
21:25
Just be all done in a different way, yeah.
21:27
So yeah, he would coordinate the logistics and then, you know,
21:31
5-10 minutes later a drone's dropping it off and he goes the
21:34
nearest Valkyrie box and grabs it and brings it to, you know,
21:37
and so yeah, it's going to open up a whole crazy world.
21:41
And you guys just did, I saw you announced that you did an
21:44
acquisition of Sky Drops. Yeah, well, tell me a little bit
21:48
about that. It's actually wild.
21:52
So sky drop. Originally they were called
21:55
Flirty and they were the first ever drone delivery company
22:01
ever, right? And I take that for granted at
22:06
times when I'm going through the the stuff we just acquired.
22:09
But you know, kind of blown away by some of it.
22:14
And I keep going back to like, Oh yeah, we got the first ever
22:19
drone delivery company. So these guys started in 2012,
22:23
moved to the States in 2014 and we're really pioneers in a lot
22:30
of the things we now take for granted across drone delivery or
22:35
just drones in general, to be honest with you.
22:38
And for a number of reasons, you know, they weren't able to
22:41
continue. So they had to, you know, put
22:45
their stuff into the courts for insolvency and and fortunately
22:50
we were able to work with their investors and and acquire their
22:55
patent portfolio. So at the time when we had first
22:59
started talking to them, it was only a handful of granted
23:02
patents and a pile of pending patents.
23:05
And so, you know, it did not everybody could see the bigger
23:14
picture, I should say, the forest with the trees with the
23:17
trees, right. And so I don't know what it was.
23:21
I happened to see what these patent applications actually
23:25
kind of were. And so we put a bid in and and
23:28
they accepted it and we had to work through that, you know
23:31
process for quite some time. But it all finally came together
23:36
the other week and we were able to execute that deal and and so
23:40
we were able to more or less double Valkyrie's portfolio.
23:46
So at that point we had we just gotten our 37th granted patent
23:53
and during that time those 5 or 6 granted sky drop patents had
24:00
turned into 36. And so add that to our 37 and
24:07
you know we've got a a substantial portfolio.
24:09
I'm sorry, 34 I'd have to look the final numbers, but it covers
24:15
a ton of stuff. These guys were so far ahead of
24:18
every other company in so many areas.
24:21
And so whether it's parachutes or winches, ground based radar,
24:26
these guys had so much that they were working on.
24:31
And so being able to carry that torch and incorporate it into
24:35
our systems and our portfolio has been just a huge honor, but
24:39
also a huge opportunity. And so we're looking at what
24:44
this new portfolio covers and, and it's, it's almost everything
24:51
required for a drone operation. And last time we talked to
24:57
obviously had one Northwestern as a customer or maybe it'd been
25:00
a while, but they were a current customer.
25:01
And I'm curious how how some of those projects and customers are
25:04
going. Yeah.
25:05
You know, we're seeing, if anything, it's almost like
25:09
before the tsunami, right? You see the tide pull back
25:14
unnaturally far, right? We're seeing a lot of that where
25:18
a lot of these big companies are, you know, putting their
25:22
heads together going. All right, 2026, it's happening.
25:26
We're able to really kick this into high gear, fly beef loss,
25:30
put all these routes together that, you know we've been
25:32
thinking about for the last decade.
25:34
And so we're seeing almost 2025 being a planning year for 2026
25:43
and you know, we still saw a record numbers across the drone
25:47
industry in a number of different areas.
25:51
So I think next year's going to be just mind blowing.
25:54
I think the the amount of attention, the amount of money
25:57
that's going to flow into the drone space, I think it's just
25:59
going to blow people's mind. Yeah, we're going to get some
26:02
rate cuts, so it'll be more liquidity and spend and that
26:04
kind of stuff too. It'd be nice.
26:06
We'll see. So if if it's obvious that
26:10
drones are going to be delivering packages, do you
26:12
think about drones delivering humans in terms of what, what is
26:17
the time frame and what does that look like in your mind?
26:19
You know, because at some point, just naturally, it's like you're
26:21
gonna have a package or something brought to you by a
26:23
drone eventually. Just a little bigger scale than
26:26
that, probably more complexity. You would just hop on a drone
26:29
cars, you would do a transport that way and then you got like
26:32
it's kind of like The Jets in this type of thing, you know?
26:34
What do you think about that whole space?
26:35
Is that something you guys are ever going to get into or are
26:37
you focused? OK, I didn't think so.
26:38
We'll never be in And so the advanced air mobility, right,
26:42
AAM kind of covers the whole overarching umbrella from air
26:46
taxis all the way to, you know, little packages.
26:50
And so we focus on the package and just more last mile side of
26:56
the drone, right, some sort of security DFR things like that,
27:00
but really sub 10 miles, but you get into larger drones that are
27:06
doing mid mile cargo right. One of the guests on the panel
27:12
that we were on Manao, CEO of mighty fly.
27:16
They're doing some really amazing things with, you know,
27:20
they're they're or cigar type shape, but they still have, you
27:24
know, the props and everything, right?
27:26
But they're flying much heavier cargo, longer distances, right?
27:31
And so there's going to be huge mid mile opportunities where,
27:37
for instance, you would have one of their systems flying, you
27:40
know, a few 100 miles between, let's just say hubs, right?
27:45
And then you would have our systems that would be able to
27:48
break that down and distribute it in those areas, right?
27:52
And so I think there's going to be a lot of multi tenancy in
27:58
these new projects and new kind of things that are coming up.
28:02
So we're really excited. We're still working with all of
28:05
our partners. We've got some new partners
28:08
we're going to be announcing very soon.
28:11
It's it's very exciting time. Very cool.
28:14
Yeah. It it almost seems like you
28:15
could imagine a world in a few decades or so.
28:18
We're like ground transportation is just not even a thing
28:21
anymore. See, that's where I I don't
28:23
agree on that. I think that.
28:25
Well, you would know, yeah. I would say that you know.
28:28
I'm talking like far and because what would be the point if you
28:31
could fly? It's just so much faster.
28:33
I mean this would be not obviously way in the future,
28:35
but. There's still plenty of of need
28:37
for ground and I don't think drones will ever replace trucks.
28:40
I think if anything we saw during COVID, you know, we we
28:45
need our ground based and it's already it's tapped as can be.
28:49
We don't have a lot of extra room.
28:52
And so drones will be a great addition and alleviate a lot of
28:57
the kind of pressure we have on our last mile.
29:00
But just the need for ground based vehicles, if anything, I
29:04
think we're going to have more incorporation of them.
29:08
So why wouldn't you just take the truck and just make it fly?
29:11
There's, there's people trying to do that and.
29:14
That's that seems like a tough. Project.
29:16
That's actually that's the problem, right?
29:19
So. But I'm talking but if you flash
29:20
forward fifty 100 years. Possibly, yeah.
29:23
This is where material science and.
29:25
Things seem out of this world. We're probably dealing with a
29:26
whole new set of like, I mean, just completely different.
29:30
I mean, there's a lot of people right now that are looking at
29:32
how do I, for instance, land at a hospital and then use a
29:38
vehicle to take it in, right. And so there's there's different
29:41
ways to incorporate ground based vehicles.
29:43
So I mean, like, I think ground based robotics have been
29:48
deployed wrong in the last decade.
29:50
Like we've tried to do all the the whole delivery route or the
29:55
entire, you know, project, whatever it is with the ground
29:58
based vehicle. And we're seeing like people
30:02
suck, right? Like they're just, you don't
30:03
want people sharing their space with any kind of robots.
30:07
Like they would destroy them, they'd kick them, they'd try and
30:09
rob them or they're off all these robots.
30:12
And so, you know, people need to get people space, right?
30:16
And so if we have these kind of mixed routes where drones are
30:21
delivering to these transfer stations and then that transfers
30:25
it to ground robotics or, you know, just all kinds of
30:28
different ways we can interoperate and hybridize these
30:32
these routes. But I think that's more how
30:34
they're going to be used rather than just kind of going by the
30:37
wayside. But yeah, I definitely think
30:40
we've seen a lot of the limitations of them in the last
30:43
decade for sure. Yeah, I wonder the last time you
30:46
were here, we talked about UA PS And I want to share something.
30:51
I'm going to play a quick video. It's a short video, maybe a
30:53
minute and a half, and we'll watch it, listen to it.
30:56
You guys can watch and listen to it as you're here.
30:58
And then we'll react and have a little conversation around it
31:01
because this has to do with flying things in the air.
31:03
It's not sure. I don't know what this thing is.
31:05
We'll play it, but. The newly released video
31:09
captured by AUS Reaper drone shows a glowing orb off the
31:13
coast of Yemen. Suddenly, on the left side of
31:16
your screen, you see a Hellfire missile zip in, strike that
31:20
unidentified object and bounce right off it.
31:23
When we slow the video down, you see the Hellfire missile
31:27
continue to travel on its path, that trajectory becoming clearer
31:31
from this zoomed out angle. Not shown is a second Reaper
31:35
drone that launched the missile. Congressman Eric Burleson shared
31:38
the video at a House Oversight Committee on what the military
31:41
calls unidentified aerial phenomena, better known as UFOs.
31:46
That's a Hellfire missile smacking into that UFO and just
31:50
bounced right off and it kept going.
31:53
It kept going. And it looks like the debris was
31:55
taken with it. Yeah.
31:56
What? What the hell is that?
31:57
We've never seen a Hellfire missile hit a target and bounce
32:01
off. Lou Elizondo is a former senior
32:04
intelligence officer with the Pentagon.
32:06
The Hellfire makes a hit, a kinetic strike on something
32:09
solid. There's usually not much left of
32:12
of whatever it is it's hitting. The hell do you think that was?
32:17
That took a Hellfire missile and just don't keep going.
32:20
I mean, I think there's. Have you seen that clip?
32:23
I I haven't seen that one specifically right.
32:26
It's definitely wild. It's just.
32:28
Like, we just go about our day, like where nothing's going on,
32:30
Yeah. There's so much going on in this
32:32
decade that. Freaking Hellfire missile.
32:35
I mean, you were in the military.
32:36
I mean, maybe you didn't fire a Hellfire missile, but you,
32:38
you're familiar. Fires make a mess of whatever
32:41
they hit. It's no joke and you think just
32:43
ricocheted off it. Yeah.
32:45
But again, like when was the last time we had a real
32:49
demonstration of any technology, right, right.
32:52
Like we unveiled at the F117, the B2, right, in the last 30
33:00
years, right. Like, I don't know if that's
33:06
ours, if that's foreign, if that's outside of any of the
33:10
major players that, you know, we are actively training and
33:15
tracking, right, like. There is there was a new
33:19
documentary if you're interested in this kind of stuff called The
33:21
Age of Disclosure. It's on.
33:23
I think it's in theaters now, but you can also find it on the
33:25
Amazon. Directed and produced by Dan
33:27
Farrah, I think is how you say his name and they it features 34
33:31
senior members of the US government military intelligence
33:35
community. It reveals an 80 year cover up
33:37
of existence, non non human intelligent life and a secret
33:40
war amongst major nations, which we kind of talked about going on
33:44
earlier, ironically to reverse engineer technology of non human
33:48
origin. I mean, to me it kind of
33:51
there's, there's definitely something governments are
33:53
hiding. There's no, I mean that's just
33:55
for anything. We all know that, but it it I
33:58
don't know man. I'm I'm kind of 5050 on this.
34:01
There's 5050 on. There's part of me that thinks
34:03
that like absolutely, we found aliens, spacecrafts, that type
34:07
of technology, and now we are back engineering it.
34:09
And then there's 20% of me of the thinks that maybe there's no
34:12
aliens at all. There was just somehow this
34:15
technology discovered and we don't want to release it or
34:17
whoever doesn't want to release it until you absolutely need it.
34:20
But yeah, I think it's but. Wouldn't that be the ultimate
34:23
negotiation power? Wouldn't you that one country
34:26
had it over the other It almost like you'd have to bow to that
34:28
country. That's why they haven't released
34:31
it yet, right? Wait till the next major
34:33
conflict and then all of a sudden, you know we show up over
34:37
all the Chinese cities and UFOs or vice versa, right?
34:41
The battle's over, right? And.
34:43
So exactly. You know, yes, I think there is
34:46
absolutely that type of thing. But you know, when we say
34:49
aliens, right? Like we discovered this
34:52
technology, right? One way or the other, right?
34:56
Right. I mean, I think.
34:57
Clearly it's there because we just saw it and we just
34:59
witnessed it and that's like an approved legit video.
35:01
It's not like some bullshit and fake stuff like.
35:03
Right. I mean, it's there.
35:04
Congress, you know what I mean? So obviously it's verified it's
35:07
and there's a there's a ton of those types of videos too.
35:10
So the tech is there. It's there, right?
35:13
Can't dispute it. When we say aliens, what does
35:15
that mean? Something that's non human
35:17
origins from a different. Planet but again, we're could be
35:22
from our planet could be from way in the past, right?
35:29
It could be entirely based on Earth and what we found here,
35:35
right? Like we.
35:35
Could be in a simulation right now.
35:37
Could be, right? Like, there's so many things and
35:39
it's so weird when you think of the implications of some of this
35:43
stuff and really peel it back, you know?
35:47
But even the fact like this could all be going on just
35:51
within Earth, like, and we keep hearing this interdimensional
35:55
stuff they keep saying in Congress.
35:56
And so you know. I think there's something there
35:58
for sure. Absolutely.
36:00
But you know, there there doesn't need to be a alien from
36:03
any other planet for it to be interdimensional.
36:06
I don't like who knows what's on the other side of that right And
36:11
so. Well, and if you just think,
36:14
even if you did think about like what if there was a another
36:17
civilization that's just like a million years ahead of us?
36:20
I mean, if they're just a million or even 1000, 2005
36:23
10,000 in terms of technology, I mean it'd be like us dropping in
36:27
2000 years ago. They would be like these fucking
36:29
these are guys are aliens. What is this flying thing in the
36:31
sky like? I think there's a lot of
36:34
evidence for there being a major cat catastrophic situation
36:39
12,500 or so years ago, right, right around younger driest time
36:43
frame. I think, you know, what caused
36:45
that or whatever, right? But all the megafauna and North
36:48
America disappeared and civilizations and everything
36:51
disappeared from North America had to have been pretty rough,
36:54
right? And you know, who's to say that
37:00
the most advanced civilizations from that time didn't find a way
37:04
to go underground or find a way to, you know, and so who knows
37:08
what technology they had. So I mean, it very well could
37:11
absolutely be the possibility of what's going on.
37:16
Yeah, I wonder if, I wonder if, if it makes me wonder if we do
37:19
have My number one thing I'm curious about is does the do the
37:24
governments have this already or is it really something like we
37:27
see interact with and don't? No, we obviously have it.
37:30
So. I mean, there's, there's been a
37:32
lot that's come out and I think this is what the I mean.
37:34
Marco Rubio is on in this film. I mean, he's, you know.
37:37
I haven't seen the film. It's like the prominent people.
37:41
It's not like somebody trying to, you know, take photos or
37:43
like interview someone that said they got abducted.
37:46
This is like. The age.
37:47
Of disclosure go check it out. I haven't watched yet actually,
37:49
but it's. There was it's.
37:52
Pretty revealing. With the 1933 magenta craft that
37:57
crashed in Italy that we recovered, what was it after
38:02
World War Two or something with Mussolini?
38:04
I don't know, but I think we've known for a long time and I
38:10
don't know if it was the weapons we started using around World
38:14
War 2 or what, but it seems that there was definitely an uptick
38:20
after that. Yeah, that's what I wrote about
38:24
too. It'd be kind of weird because
38:26
like all the stuff that you guys were doing, the entire
38:28
community, if you had this new technology, would just change
38:31
everything. If you ever had access to that
38:32
technology overnight, you'd probably solve every single
38:35
problem. Yes, yeah, a lot of ways.
38:37
I mean that's when I when you start talking about the
38:40
implications. I think what they've been hiding
38:43
is much more so they've had this technology and right.
38:47
I think that's kind of understood at this point is a
38:53
lot of countries have this right.
38:54
I think that was that hidden war they were talking about.
38:57
But the cover up program, right, the the black budgets that have
39:02
gone into testing this, I mean, that's all going to be accounted
39:05
for. People have to answer for that.
39:07
And there was a lot, I'm sure of craziness going on there.
39:12
And so I think that might be the scarier thread for them to kind
39:18
of pull out then, you know, all free, this free energy,
39:22
whatever. Right now, some of the
39:25
implications if you actually look at, you know, theory,
39:29
relativity and all these other things like, yeah, who knows
39:32
what what the actual propulsion mechanism is, right?
39:36
If it is actually pulling through wormholes or this or
39:39
totally right. But yeah, I mean that that's
39:41
time travel, right, Right. And so when you start looking
39:45
at, you know, special relativity and things like that, you get
39:48
into some scary, you know, going 1000 years on that craft could
39:54
be 10,000 or 10 million years back home, you know, depending.
39:58
And so there's probably bigger reasons why you don't want
40:04
everyday people just using this technology outside of, yeah, you
40:10
know, it's cool and fly anywhere.
40:14
Yeah. Do you think you'd ever do
40:16
another business that's outside of out of the drones and the
40:19
technology in this? Because you're in a very
40:20
innovative, things change by the day, it's very exciting, it's
40:24
kind of sexy. Do you think you'll stay, you'll
40:26
be in this industry or something related to it?
40:28
I don't know, I never say never, but you know, there's, there's
40:31
definitely been enough excitement over the last 20
40:34
years of my career that I don't know that I'd take another 13 to
40:39
plus your challenge on like I have with drones.
40:42
When did you start the company? This started in 2017 and started
40:46
working on this technology in 2013.
40:49
Jeez man, it's been a long time. Did it take you longer than you
40:53
thought or is this what you? Anticipated longer.
40:54
Really, it usually does. Yeah, I, I figured, you know,
40:58
there was going to be, it was the, the adoption and the
41:05
acceptance curve was a lot different than I thought.
41:08
For instance, you know, I talked to people in the military,
41:12
right? 2018.
41:13
I'm going, hey, this is, this is the move.
41:16
And they're going, you know, no, no, no, you're crazy.
41:18
And I'm going, well, I've got military experience.
41:20
I've got this strong experience. Like, trust me, I know what I'm
41:23
talking about, right? And then no, no, no, no.
41:26
And then Ukraine comes and all of a sudden everybody dives into
41:31
it. And, you know, this DFR is a
41:35
perfect example. I look back at interviews I was
41:39
doing back in 2018-2019, you know, mentioning this.
41:45
And because knowing we have a lot of key patents in this area
41:49
would be protected, but watching kind of the industry just move
41:55
in that direction and adopt that.
41:58
Yeah, it's been interesting to say the least.
42:00
But I don't know that I'd want to take this challenge on again.
42:04
It seems like when you start a business or some type of venture
42:07
like this, I know for me it always, it just does take longer
42:10
than you think, like whether it's an investment of business,
42:13
it just and I think that's why the power of staying in the game
42:16
and continuing to get better. It's like it is a battle of
42:19
attrition sometimes. No, it is, you know, like
42:21
people. Most most people wouldn't have
42:22
waited as long as you did. They didn't like this dude I'm
42:25
out of for three or four years and didn't take off.
42:28
You know, and that's, you know, where I think a lot of people
42:31
kind of, I don't know, they they set their own demise in a lot of
42:38
ways or probably, you know, prevent themselves from kind of
42:42
where they could be. Yeah, because it's not
42:46
everything happens that quickly. And yeah, I filed these patents
42:50
for tough this awesome technology and then boom, we get
42:53
a 10 year government ban, right. I mean, what are you going to
42:57
do? And so it's been, it's been a
43:01
challenge. And you know, some days I am
43:04
ripping my hair out, but that grit is all that really matters,
43:09
right? And even, you know, six years
43:11
in, I'd sit there and do the same calculations almost every
43:16
morning, right? Like, is this the right place of
43:19
my spending my time and resources in the right
43:22
direction, right area? Like what, not getting caught in
43:29
the sunk fallacy costs, right? Or some cost fallacy.
43:34
They should say sorry, but going, you know, hey, I spent
43:37
four years on this, you know, I'm PAC community that I want
43:40
to, you know, look like I failed.
43:42
But at some points, you know, you got to say, hey, it's not
43:44
going to work. That's right.
43:46
When my first patents was on 3D printing, it wasn't my first
43:52
patent. It was on 3D printing from an
43:54
advertisement way back in 2012. And we had filed this patent
44:00
application and spent money on it, a bunch of money at the
44:02
time. And, you know, a year of our
44:04
lives and we had gotten the patent granted and, you know,
44:09
we're about to pay our issue fee.
44:12
And that was right when the Alice VCLS court decision
44:15
happened, which wiped out all software patents, right?
44:18
So I just spent all this time and money on this and my lawyer,
44:21
you know, like, whoa, we get our money refunded.
44:25
He's like, no, like here's screw you're out at like I go.
44:28
So the Supreme Court just makes a decision.
44:31
A year of my life, 25 grants all out the window and.
44:35
Don't even care. That's it.
44:36
That's that's you're in the big game now, right And so.
44:39
That's how it is. It is cutthroat.
44:41
It is, but I learned a ton and you know, I went to my Co
44:44
inventor at the time was, you know, we're going to take this
44:47
on the chin or are we going to fight back?
44:49
Right. And so, you know, we filed drone
44:53
patent from that kind of frustration or chip on her
44:58
shoulder, you know, so I mean, in a lot of ways, it opened that
45:01
door and I wouldn't have had that experience that I needed to
45:05
navigate where I was. So in a lot of ways, I wouldn't
45:10
be where I was without that failure, right?
45:13
But we knew right away, let's close the door on that one,
45:17
start something else, right? But you know, often times you'll
45:21
see people for sentimental reason for this, for that,
45:24
though run a business longer than they should or you know,
45:28
not push it as far as long as they should kind of hit that
45:32
that success. And there's no real way of
45:35
knowing. Often times you know which side
45:38
you're on. Yeah.
45:40
Are you happy most days? I don't.
45:42
You don't think about it. I don't know.
45:46
What, what's your gauge? What's kind of your North Star?
45:47
Like, can you look at your value of your life?
45:49
It's like, you know, like a fulfillment.
45:51
Am I generally happy? You're not gonna be happy all
45:52
the time. You have shit happen, obviously.
45:54
But like what's kind of your North Star in terms of?
45:56
You know, I look back at kind of the moments that I would say I'm
46:00
proudest of or, you know, that kind of impacted me most.
46:04
And they were never fun. You know, I mean, like Ranger
46:08
School wasn't fun, you know, being in the 75th and deploying
46:12
with them, you know, it wasn't fun.
46:15
But those are the most impactful and, you know, challenging
46:19
things I've ever done and change me in profound ways, right?
46:25
You know, grad school wasn't fun, you know, but obviously it
46:31
did changed and and taught me all kinds of things, right.
46:35
And so I don't necessarily gauge it by happiness, right?
46:39
If anything, those kind of pleasure and, and kind of
46:43
fleeting happiness type stuff, right?
46:45
And people think, you know, I went on vacation or, you know,
46:49
did this or whatever. And don't get me wrong, you
46:52
know, friends and family and those things are extremely
46:54
important, but I don't necessarily kind of chase those
46:59
things. You know, I mean, the the the
47:03
pleasure side of it or the kind of happiness side of it.
47:07
I'm just very mission driven. And, you know, I set out to do
47:11
this. And, you know, just so happened.
47:13
I probably just like when I signed up for the Army, didn't
47:17
quite know what I was biting off.
47:19
But you know, I made a commitment to myself though that
47:24
day that I was going to see this through no matter what.
47:27
And that's kind of the most important thing for me is, is
47:30
seeing this to a point where, you know, I've gotten this
47:34
technology out there, I've gotten it to a point where it's
47:37
helping people. And, and, you know, we've gotten
47:40
a good return for our investors and all of the things that kind
47:43
of go into a success on this. But yeah, it's it's a dogfight
47:49
most days. It's an interesting topic
47:52
because it's like, what do you use as your compass in life?
47:57
You know, And it's like you because you could.
47:59
Some people are like, I want to be happy and I'm going to live a
48:01
lifestyle and that's fine. Some people mission driven.
48:04
Some people like I want to feel fulfilled, like I'm doing good
48:06
shit if it makes me feel good. Other people, you know, have
48:10
different things and it's, it's sometimes it's I kind of wonder,
48:14
like it's a combination of things, but it's like, I
48:16
definitely know that I'm not going to be happy all the time.
48:18
So I don't I don't chase that for sure.
48:20
I do look at fulfilment relationships.
48:23
Am I doing something? I'm proud.
48:24
Of Do you read philosophy at all?
48:26
Not really, no, but I think it's quite interesting.
48:28
I think that's you'd enjoy reading some philosophy.
48:33
Yeah, probably, probably would. Those guys all try.
48:35
To enlighten me what I. Mean it's those questions,
48:39
right? Like what's the purpose of life
48:41
is happiness? You know, like I'm a big fan of
48:44
Nietzsche and, and you know, he's very adamant the world is a
48:49
cold, dark place and owes you nothing, right?
48:53
And it's up to you to realize that, you know, you don't really
48:57
matter in this world. You know, like there's no
48:59
purpose to you. You are just part of a much
49:03
bigger ecosystem and a much bigger kind of song playing out
49:07
and you're just one note in it, right?
49:09
And you know, what do you, what do you do with that information
49:12
that you don't matter? Nothing you do really in all
49:16
reality is going to matter. The sun's eventually going to
49:19
explode, eat the earth up. It all gets erased.
49:22
Nothing you do will eventually be there, right?
49:24
So what do you do with the information that it doesn't
49:29
necessarily matter? And that can be kind of freeing
49:31
too, because sometimes you tell, Oh my gosh, this and now I got
49:34
to do that in my life is and everyone's watching me and it's
49:37
like nothing, no one cares. Go, go do your own thing.
49:40
It's freeing because you can then just say, well, what would
49:42
I want to do that would get me excited to get out of bed every
49:45
day? That's it.
49:46
You know. Like once you have that kind of
49:48
freedom, you know, and I, I was fortunate to be able to have
49:54
early successes with my entrepreneur journey and that
49:58
was able to kind of fund the, the stuff I'm working on now to
50:02
some extent, or at least seeding those.
50:04
But you know, once you kind of, you know, everybody says, I want
50:08
to work for myself. And you know that that's a
50:11
double edged sword. You're going to work as hard as
50:13
you've ever worked and longer hours than you've ever thought
50:16
possible. And you'll, you know, make the
50:19
much less money doing it that way, at least in the short run
50:22
than you would working for someone else, right.
50:25
And so, you know, OK, now, now you're your own boss.
50:28
Now what you know, like, and then you get 6 at now what?
50:33
Like what is your reason to get out of bed every day?
50:37
And, and you know, you'll see a lot of people kind of hit that
50:41
wall or, or kind of spiral out or just kind of like you said,
50:45
ride off into the sunset and spend 20-30 years just hanging
50:49
out, right? Like, what do you do with it?
50:51
And and that's the big question, everything for everybody.
50:54
Yeah. I look at it like I think I kind
50:58
of evaluate my life was in my more the business career side is
51:02
am I getting up every day and excited to work on the thing I'm
51:05
doing And the moment I'm kind of like not excited anymore.
51:08
It's not like a short term something happened.
51:09
It's like I just my heart is saying this like I'm not
51:12
excited. I don't want to learn more about
51:14
it. I don't want to absorb stuff
51:15
about it. I'm not excited to like Saturday
51:17
morning. So you're probably the same way.
51:19
Saturday morning, Sunday mornings, I'm working, you know,
51:21
like before my kids get up and for my girlfriend, like I'm
51:24
doing stuff not because I have to, because I just, I'm excited
51:27
to let. And even this morning I get up
51:29
at 53545, I do a little quick read and then I get to work and
51:34
it's like one of the best parts of my day.
51:36
I get my coffee, I'm on my computer.
51:38
It's like I'm fucking happy, man.
51:39
Like I'm in my zone. That's where you want to be when
51:42
you know those flow states. There's nothing better, right?
51:45
Nothing better. Yeah.
51:46
You know, there's days where I pushed myself so far the the day
51:51
before. You know that I've got to peel
51:54
myself out of the bed. You know that's.
51:57
True. I get up and going to get that
51:59
coffee in me. I'm rocking and rolling and then
52:01
I'll push myself as hard as I can till I redline and then
52:04
crash that day and then peel myself up, you know, And so
52:08
there's, there's days I do that, you know, it's, I've realized as
52:13
I've gotten older that, you know, this is a marathon and not
52:17
a Sprint. I, that's right through my 20s,
52:20
I sprinted a lot of it and I burned myself out more than I
52:25
care to admit a few times in my 20s and early 30s, you know, But
52:33
it's, yeah, it's, it's that, right?
52:35
Like you've got to want this. And if you don't want this, I
52:38
mean, I see it with some of the people I've hired and probably,
52:42
you know, not necessarily my best hires, but you know, the
52:47
kids that are in it for a paycheck, the kids that jump
52:49
jobs every two years, you know, like they're, they're, I worry
52:54
about that group because I, I, they're missing a major piece
53:00
where, you know, yes, you don't always get that raise every two
53:04
years, but you see that project through, you grow, you get that
53:07
better position, whatever it may be.
53:09
And, and again, not every situations like that, this isn't
53:12
a blanket statement, but you know, I, I just kind of overall
53:16
see a little bit too transactional, I would say of
53:21
kind of that mentality. And you, you shouldn't have that
53:25
with your job in time. Like, I get it, a lot of it is
53:29
just a job. You're, you're, you're doing it,
53:31
you're getting your money so you can go focus on your passion
53:34
later on, whatever. But I think there's just a lot
53:39
missing in the way these kids are operating in, in some ways
53:43
because you, you lose a lot of the relationships that get
53:47
built, the the mentorships, the just so many things that can
53:53
throw from that. But yeah, it it worries me in
53:58
some ways on them. I agree.
53:59
I agree with you. I think in most cases, I think
54:02
you can find a way to mix your passion or what you're excited
54:05
or fulfilled by with an income. Oh yeah, but you're going to
54:08
have to work your ass off and you might have to get really
54:10
creative and you might be uncomfortable for a while.
54:13
And you're not there's. A way.
54:14
No, I'd just rather do that path.
54:16
I'd rather take the harder path and go that route than like work
54:19
some job I fucking hate and then like save the money to go live
54:23
on the weekends the life I really want.
54:25
Yeah, that that I don't I've never understood that life, but
54:29
I I think that people often. Retire at 65 and then go live
54:32
their life. That's that's awful.
54:33
That's ridiculous. I, I think that, you know,
54:37
people forget that it's not greener on the other side always
54:42
in the sense of like, you know, I want to be a police officer.
54:47
Well, half your job's doing paper or paperwork, right?
54:51
And even firefighters, right? The amount of chemical exposure
54:59
and health risks that they're, you know, exposed to over their
55:02
career that definitely aren't paid for, right?
55:05
There's all these kind of setbacks, right?
55:09
I mean, I love being a Ranger, right?
55:12
But there was maybe 1% of the time doing the commercial stuff
55:18
and 99% of the time doing anything else, whether cleaning
55:23
gear, it's running, it's working, you know, just all the
55:27
things that make you able to do that 1%, right?
55:31
But that 99% is the journey, right?
55:34
Like that is the day-to-day, the BS, the, you know, I don't like
55:41
having to do XYZ, but that comes with the job.
55:44
You don't get to just pick the good parts.
55:47
I think there's kind of this mindset that I'm just going to
55:50
do what I like and not the whole thing, right?
55:55
It doesn't work. But that's why a lot of these
55:58
kids are kind of, you know, having some of the challenges
56:01
that they are is because they don't want to take on the whole
56:05
the whole burden. That's a good point, because
56:07
even if you're really interested in something, you got to go
56:09
market that, you got to go sell it, you got to have operations
56:12
around it, you got to fulfill it.
56:13
And so it's like whatever you pick, there's going to be
56:15
aspects that you maybe don't like, right?
56:18
But I don't know, I think I found a way to either somewhat
56:22
enjoy those aspects or just know they come with the territory and
56:25
you got to it's just like. The maturity of it, yeah, it is
56:27
what it is. And you got to not every single
56:29
day. You're like, I don't want to do
56:30
this thing right now, but I got to do it.
56:32
That is what it is, yeah. You're an adult.
56:34
You it comes with the job. I, yeah, got to do XY and Z to
56:38
do the other parts that I do enjoy, right.
56:41
Or, you know, something they always taught us in the Army was
56:43
just embrace the suck. If you learn to enjoy those
56:47
things that you know people don't enjoy, whether it's
56:49
crunching the numbers or doing the tedious, you know whatever
56:53
that gets you so much further when you're willing to do the
56:57
work and you're good at it that other people don't want to can't
57:01
whatever it may be, and so that's where people really start
57:05
shining in their career. People miss that.
57:08
You know there's a lot in those kind of in betweens, yes, I
57:13
also. Like there's an opportunity for
57:14
everyone to push themselves more and level up themselves.
57:17
And I'm looking at that end of year, I always do a lot of
57:19
reflecting and I'm like, did I push myself enough this year?
57:22
You know, like I think there's an opportunity to like, what is
57:25
your true potential? Because that is part of what I'm
57:27
going after in life is if it's like the same, if you met
57:30
yourself 100 years from now in heaven, let's say, or wherever
57:34
you go, and they showed you the full pretend potential version
57:38
of you. And they're like, this is what
57:39
you were meant to be or could have been.
57:41
And then this is where what you did with it.
57:43
And it's kind of like, damn, I could have been that.
57:45
I could have done this. I could have had this, this, and
57:47
whether that's personal or business or whatever, I think
57:50
you're always kind of like looking in the mirror and saying
57:51
it might be in the best version of me.
57:53
Well, you can't have it all, right?
57:54
I mean, you know, you're going to have to make sacrifices no
57:57
matter which path you choose, right?
57:59
So you're always going to have a version of you that you could
58:03
have been. That's a good point.
58:05
So again, it's not necessarily grasses greener, but you know, a
58:09
lot of people compare themselves to others and, you know, keeping
58:13
up with the Joneses and this and that.
58:15
And it's really about my beating who I was yesterday exactly, you
58:18
know, and as long as that I'm improving that I'm where I want
58:23
to be, right. But a lot of people have a tough
58:28
time kind of, you know, just reflecting, being honest with
58:32
themselves, kind of just, you know, truly being critical when
58:37
somebody gives them feedback, you know, taking it in and and
58:42
going, is there some truth in this or whatever?
58:44
But most people get insecure, get defensive, react, whatever
58:47
it may be. And so, you know, again, it
58:51
just, it's people kind of showing where their lines are
58:55
and kind of what level of development they've gotten to,
58:59
you know, but everybody's on their own journey.
59:04
That's right, man. So what's next for Valkyrie?
59:07
What's new and exciting? Any new launches?
59:09
Anything on your radar? Partnerships.
59:11
We've been really pushing their new tech transfer and licensing
59:17
campaign and we recently signed a partner the Arrow Group
59:22
publicly traded drone company on for their first license with
59:26
that program and have big plans through 26 for it.
59:31
Now that we've got not just Valkyries 37 patents, but the
59:38
the 30 what 6 from Flirty adding those all together, it's a
59:45
really formidable patent portfolio and it covers just
59:50
such a substantial amount of really the whole drone industry
59:54
from delivery to DFR to, you know, just kind of the overall,
1:00:01
I think we're going to have one of the most critical standard
1:00:04
essential patent portfolios that there there's going to be in the
1:00:08
drone industry. And so we're.
1:00:12
Really looking at different companies we can partner with
1:00:15
and how we can, you know, get this technology proliferated
1:00:20
further and and adopted further. Really looking to kind of expand
1:00:25
more internationally. That was one thing in Hong Kong.
1:00:28
I really kind of realized is we've, you know, we've gone
1:00:34
through different projects internationally and
1:00:38
domestically. You know, we've got some big
1:00:40
ones coming up in Florida with a partner we'll be announcing
1:00:43
soon. But yeah, it's going to be an
1:00:47
exciting 2026. I love it.
1:00:51
I appreciate you coming on the show, man.
1:00:52
Where can people find you, connect with you, learn more
1:00:53
about what you guys are doing? Yeah.
1:00:54
Thank you so much for having me. They can check us out at
1:00:56
valkyrie.com or LinkedIn. Find me Ryan Walsh, happy to
1:01:03
connect and please reach out. Cool.
1:01:05
Let's have a great year, man. Let's do it going on.
1:01:07
Thank you.