Jaunt Air Mobility is a Dallas-based aerospace company building the all-electric Journey eVTOL, an air taxi that takes off like a helicopter and cruises like an airplane using patented Slowed Rotor Compound (SRC) technology. Founded in 2019 on intellectual property acquired from Carter Aviation, Jaunt is pursuing a certification path as a rotorcraft and is now a brand within publicly traded AIRO Group Holdings. Its aircraft carries a pilot and four passengers roughly 80-120 miles at 175 mph with low noise and an autorotation safety fallback.
Valtec is a San Diego-founded maritime intelligence company turning ocean data into real-time decisions. Its Larus VTOL fixed-wing hybrid drone launches straight off moving fishing vessels - no runway, no shore infrastructure - and its Fulcan AI vision stack reads the water below for fish, vessels and threats. Built first for commercial tuna fleets in Taiwan and the Philippines, Valtec's pitch is blunt: cut a month at sea down to two weeks, burn less fuel, and see what's happening in waters no one else is watching.
Odys Aviation is a Long Beach, California deep-tech aerospace company building long-range, hybrid-electric vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL) aircraft. Its blown-wing design lets aircraft lift off and land anywhere - no runway needed - while flying farther and carrying more than battery-only eVTOLs. With two platforms, the Laila tactical cargo drone and the larger Alta regional aircraft, Odys targets defense, logistics and passenger markets, and has amassed more than $11 billion in signed letters of intent.
James Dorris is the co-founder and CEO of Odys Aviation, a Long Beach company building long-range, hybrid-electric VTOL aircraft that take off and land like a helicopter but cruise like an airplane. A former fusion physicist who started at MIT's Plasma Science and Fusion Center, he helped build the propulsion and levitation tech at Virgin Hyperloop One before turning to flight. At Odys he is chasing aircraft that can lift off from a helipad, fly up to 1,000 miles on a hybrid system, and cut regional travel emissions sharply while serving defense, logistics, and passenger markets.
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 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.
John Keh is the Founder and CEO of Valtec, a San Diego-based maritime AI and drone company that deploys autonomous VTOL systems on commercial fishing vessels to detect tuna schools in real time. A UC Berkeley alumnus and former US Air Force geospatial intelligence analyst with 250+ missions across South Korea and the Middle East, Keh pivoted from food delivery (3rd employee at Caviar, Uber Eats courier intelligence lead) to maritime defense after four years building startups in Taiwan. Valtec raised a $2M pre-seed round in March 2025 backed by SparkLabs Taiwan, Wavemaker VC, DRONE FUND, Guitar Hero founder Kai Huang, and Twitch co-founder Kevin Lin, with the company's Larus VTOL drone and Fulcan AI platform now deployed on 40+ fishing vessels across Taiwan and the Philippines.