American R&D for Japanese Profit

Finally! Commercial Development of Unmanned, Solar-Powered Flying Wing
... with a little $help from our friends.

Remember - fifteen years ago! - When you first saw this beast?
     Now this amazing feat of aeronautical engineering is going to be developed further and become a spot so high in the sky you'll hardly ever see it. It can be a "flying cell tower" to bring telecom to emergency zones (It would have been a life saver over Puerto Rico). TV can be transmitted from it. Photo surveys over vast areas can be done. It can fly for weeks... maybe more!
And it's now 95% owned by a huge Japanese  telecom company, SoftBank Corp.
     The American entrepreneurs (Monrovia, CA) who developed these flying wonders for NASA couldn't find an American partner, so the biggest (by far) Japanese telecom company is starting a dual venture with American company Aerovironment to utilize these mostly solar (some hybrid with fuel cell) platforms.
     I wish (silly me) that these folks could find non-military partner in the U.S. (They sell lots of stuff to the Pentagon).
     How-some-ever... I am thrilled that this marvelous, non-polluting, super efficient technology is going to find its place serving mankind.

Read about the deal here.  And here.  (I haven't seen squat about it in the MSM.)





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