\u00a0<\/b>\u201cWe\u2019ve been talking to people in agriculture, public safety, you name the market segment, and what is clear is that they really want a helicopter\u2026 but with the usability and economics of a drone,\u201d says SiFly<\/a> chief business officer Logan Jones.<\/p>\n And Santa Clara, CA-based SiFly\u2014which has just emerged from stealth with drones its claims to fly faster, further, for longer, than anything else on the market\u2014can deliver on that promise, he claims.<\/p>\n When it comes to ag spray drones, a market currently dominated by Chinese supplier DJI<\/a>, the major barriers to adoption are cost and productivity, says Jones, who spent 13 years at Boeing. \u201cThe more time you\u2019re in the air, the more productive you are. It\u2019s a dollars and cents game. You can have the nicest, most whiz-bang piece of technology, but if it\u2019s more expensive, you\u2019re going to lose.\u201d<\/p>\n According to Jones,\u00a0\u201cThere are a couple benefits of our configuration that play out very strongly within agriculture. First, customers want removable batteries that last because they are the number one driver of cost. Second, we fly at roughly 2x the speed of other systems. So we\u2019re more productive, and we can cover more ground.\u201d<\/p>\n Meanwhile, SiFly\u2019s boom design, which deploys hydraulic nozzles and laminar flow rather than rotary atomizers, enables a higher degree of precision while spraying, he claims. In simple terms, says Jones, if you match the speed that you\u2019re pushing crop inputs out from the boom with the forward air speed, \u201cyou don\u2019t get a bunch of drift.\u201d<\/p>\n He adds: \u201cThat quality of laydown and the ability to vary it, is going to be a game changer in agriculture. We really view our competition as helicopters or ground rigs.\u201d<\/p>\n Right now, SiFly has two models: The Q12<\/a>, which in agriculture would be relevant for mapping, and the larger Q250<\/a>, which is suitable for spraying. The latter has a capacity of 30 gallons, more than double that of market leader DJI\u2019s core ag spraying models.<\/p>\n But two core principles underscore both models, says Jones. \u201cThe first is around how you manage energy. If you look at nearly every other multi-rotor [drone] out there, when they take off, 30-35% of their weight is their battery. Ideally, that percentage is 66%, and we\u2019re about 60-62%, which means we have twice the available energy on every flight to convert to endurance.\u201d<\/p>\n He adds: \u201cWe\u2019re very efficient in how we produce lift. We have a low disc loading design [whereby the drone\u2019s weight is spread over a big propeller area], which means we can use really energy dense cells [that hold a lot of energy for their size] rather than high power cells. And that has the benefit of really long life and a really favorable cost structure.\u201d<\/p>\n The second core principle is around forward flight, where the key metric is the lift-over-drag (L-over-D) ratio, he says. This measures how much upward force (lift) an aircraft gets compared to the air resistance (drag) it faces. The higher the number, the more efficient the aircraft.<\/p>\n \u201cIf you look at helicopters,\u201d says Jones, \u201cthey\u2019re around 4, or 4.5 L over D. Whereas multi-rotors [drones] are 1.2, or 1.5, which is really bad. What we\u2019ve done is bring that L over D much closer to what a helicopter would be, so somewhere around 4. So that\u2019s by looking at things like the struts that go from the body to the motors, airfoils [propeller blades] that cut through the air really nicely, and offsetting rotors, so the drone\u2019s natural position is to fly forward.<\/p>\n \u201cWe also have flatter blades like a helicopter. It\u2019s about adding layers and layers of optimization.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIf you look at the helicopter mission data,, the top end of those missions is about two hours. And the limitation is fuel and human fatigue. Our whole design thesis was if we could exceed two hours on an individual charge, then all of a sudden we\u2019re relevant for maybe 70% of the helicopter missions around data collection. And over time, as we scale up, we will be directly competitive with light helicopters.<\/em>\u201d Logan Jones, SiFly<\/strong><\/p>\n Finally, he says, SiFly has patents around technology that it can \u201cscale up into much larger systems that rival light helicopters. That is a very nice spot for the agriculture market.\u201d<\/p>\n He explains: \u201cThe way that multi rotors produce lift today is through something called RPM [rotations per minute] control, whereby each independent rotor speeds up or slows down almost instantly to produce stability and to produce lift.\u201d<\/p>\n If a drone is very light, he says, achieving lift via RPM control is not that difficult. But if you have to lift something much heavier, \u201cthere\u2019s inertia and momentum.\u201d To counter this, SiFly has patented something called torque rotor design that changes the pitch of the blade based on how much twisting force it needs to produce instant lift rather than using fixed-pitch blades that control lift by changing rotor speed (RPM).<\/p>\n From a cost standpoint, he says, \u201cWe haven\u2019t set pricing [for the Q250 model] yet, but we aim to be somewhere between the top end of the DJI market and what you see from the other Western suppliers, so we\u2019d be talking about below $100k probably.\u201d<\/p>\n SiFly\u2019s initial focus is on its smaller Q12 drones, which will be in production by the end of this year or early next, says Jones. \u201cFor the Q250, we should have a flying prototype next year.\u201d<\/p>\n SiFly makes its own batteries and is compliant with the strictures of the recent defense spending bill (NDAA), which proposes restrictions on certain communications components coming out of China (read more here<\/a>).<\/p>\n According to Jones: \u201cI\u2019m pretty confident that over time, a lot of the consumer electronic supply chain moves out of China, but right now, I would say that nearly every system on the market has exposure to Chinese sub components. We try to have dual suppliers, but this is less about compliance issues than mitigating supply chain risk.\u201d<\/p>\n Antony Yousefian, partner at VC firm The First Thirty<\/a>, which has invested in SiFly along with Qudit<\/a>, told AgFunderNews<\/em> that its investment was\u00a0\u201cprimarily driven by SiFly\u2019s potential to disrupt traditional agricultural practices.\u201d<\/p>\n He added: \u201cWe have been exploring technologies that enable precision\u00a0agriculture for some time. However, the economic viability of many solutions, particularly in areas like spraying, has been a barrier due to high costs or only marginal improvements over conventional methods like tractor usage.<\/p>\n \u201cSiFly offers a compelling solution with the potential to significantly reduce implementation costs, challenging the necessity of traditional tractor use. Its Q250 will be a game-changer for agronomy.\u201d<\/p>\n\u2018We\u2019re very efficient in how we produce lift\u2019<\/strong><\/h4>\n
Torque rotor design<\/strong><\/h4>\n
![\"SiFly](\"https:\/\/agfundernews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/SiFly-drones-Q12-and-Q250-e1748569746374.png\")
China<\/strong><\/h4>\n
A\u00a0 \u2018game changer for agronomy\u2019<\/strong><\/h4>\n