Analytics use data, complex algorithms, and software to solve business problems; to predict outcomes in new situations; and ultimately, to automate decision-making. When analytics are standardized, stakeholders can be sure that they all understand an environment in the same way and are making coordinated decisions about how to act in the environment. As Unmanned Traffic Management (UTM) systems and commercial drone applications develop, analytics are a necessary and critical tool for building interoperable solutions that will enable safe operations in the increasingly dense airspace of the future.
OneSky, through its roots with Analytical Graphics Inc. (AGI; now Ansys), has a more than 30-year history of using analytics to solve aerospace problems. That heritage is a critical piece of our development, and the OneSky UTM platform is unique in offering deep analytics that provide an accurate, shared understanding of the airspace and enable dynamic airspace management.
Ted Driver, OneSky’s Head of Analytics and Operations, is an aeronautics engineer with a rich experience in developing analytics designed to understand airspace at AGI: now, he’s applying those tools and concepts to UTM. “Our analytics come from our AGI heritage,” Driver says. “I wrote algorithms for things like navigation accuracy and communications analysis for the manned industry. Now, the unmanned industry is realizing just how important these analytics are.”
Analytics in the OneSky Platform
OneSky’s platform provides aviation stakeholders globally with a visual understanding of shared airspace, and tools that help to predict outcomes and provide actionable insights. We offer direct access to our analytics through APIs for Air Navigation Service Providers (ANSP), drone operators, or Urban Air Mobility (UAM) stakeholders, among others.
In the complex environment of dense airspace that accommodates many types of aircraft, tools to help automate decision-making ensure safety and fairness. Analytics can help solve industry problems like scheduling commercial UAS operations in an equitable way that balances the purpose and importance of the flight with capacity limitations; or rescheduling flights based on a deep understanding of the environment that includes data elements like weather, typical traffic patterns, urban environment analysis, and more.
Analytics help drone operators and enterprises plan their flights for optimal safety and efficiency by considering many data points like population, terrain, and communications capacity. These tools help pilots deal with unexpected events or dynamic changes in an environment, such as a sudden storm or an unanticipated TFR. Enterprise customers can use these analytics to effectively manage their risk in a scalable, effective way.
Analytics Enable the Growth of the Industry
Commercial drone operations are expanding rapidly. As large enterprises adopt drone technology, analytics will become increasingly important, as they are in any enterprise effort. Beyond flight planning and UTM, analytics provide critical tools for insurance, help develop and automate operational risk assessments for advanced operations like BVLOS flight and enable collaboration with other enterprise projects.
“True data - and integration and visualization of the data - are the core of any system,” Driver explains. “When we start implementing a good analytics strategy, we can start working together in the same airspace – until we do that, we can’t work together, because we aren’t speaking the same language.”
As the global UTM community works to develop an interoperable airspace management solution, standardized analytics are a critical feature that will help all airspace users. OneSky’s analytics provide essential capabilities and a significant advantage for stakeholders developing the drone industry of the future.
Learn more about how OneSky's Analytics can support your UTM journey at www.onesky.xyz/analytics.
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