unmanned-aircraft
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The Austin Drone Company Betting the Air Force Will Ditch the $30,000 Helicopter Hour
Skyways flies cargo drones nobody steers - no joystick, no remote pilot - between air bases and out to oil rigs. Now it wants to turn a hand-built aircraft into a production line.
Poseidon Aerospace
Poseidon Aerospace is a San Francisco startup building unmanned cargo aircraft designed to move heavy loads to places without runways. Founded in 2024 by ex-Amazon engineer David Zagaynov and ex-Lockheed Martin engineer Parker Tenney, the company is developing two purpose-built autonomous platforms - Egret, a short takeoff and landing aircraft, and Heron, an amphibious seaplane - each engineered to carry up to two tons roughly 1,500 miles. Backed by an $11M seed round led by Tamarack Global, Poseidon aims to slash the cost-per-ton-mile of air logistics for both commercial feeder routes and contested military supply missions, with first full-scale flight tests targeted for mid-2026.
David Zagaynov
David Zagaynov is the CEO and co-founder of Poseidon Aerospace, a San Francisco aerospace startup building unmanned, runway-independent cargo aircraft. A UC Berkeley computer science graduate and former Amazon software engineer, he co-founded the company in 2023 with Parker Tenney and Isaac Baumstark around a shared obsession with the ekranoplan, a Soviet Cold War boat-plane that skimmed just above the water. Poseidon is developing the Heron seaplane and the Egret short-takeoff aircraft, each designed to haul up to two tons of cargo over 1,500 miles. The company raised an $11 million seed round in November 2025 led by Tamarack Global, after a $1.4 million pre-seed led by Starship Ventures.
Mark Strauss
Mark Strauss is the co-founder and CEO of WaveAerospace, a Stratford, Connecticut drone manufacturer building unmanned aircraft engineered to fly in the wind, rain and snow that ground everyone else. A Yale chemistry graduate, airplane racer and pilot who flew before he could legally drive, Strauss teamed with aerospace engineer Steve Bofill to design a new class of all-weather UAS - from the wind-beating Falcon II to the 300-mph Huntress turbojet - sold to police, emergency services, militaries and foreign governments including Ecuador. The company closed an oversubscribed Series A in 2023 at a $40 million pre-money valuation.
WaveAerospace
WaveAerospace builds unmanned aircraft that fly when nothing else can. Based in Stratford, Connecticut, the company designs heavy-weather drones, UAVs and hybrid VTOL aircraft for police, emergency services, offshore operators and the military - machines rated to operate in wind, rain and snow that ground conventional drones. Its lineup includes the all-weather Falcon II multicopter, the GPS-contested Nyx, the heavy-lift Mule, and the Huntress Turbojet, a hybrid jet that reaches roughly Mach 0.4.