Sunlight Aerospace™ is a pioneer in Sunlink® high-altitude, long-endurance (HALE) drones and Sunfleet® airborne network technologies.

To carry significant payload, solar drones have trended historically too large of wingspans subject to stress and structural failure. Sunlight® has developed inherently stable and robust Sunlink® airframe designs scaled down for formation flight in swarms called Sunfleets with distributed power and functionality.

Sunfleet® formations essentially synthesize via software control the effective lift/drag of large wingspans. Sunfleets can be optimally sized for performance, resilience, endurance, and manufacturability.

Notable innovations include:

Back to top

Sunfleet® Networks, Sky Wide Coverage™, provide direct-to-customer connectivity, universal coverage, and reliable service, even in disasters, at a lower cost than terrestrial networks. Sunfleet® Network advantages are many. Among them are:

Expanded customer base — Direct access to customer’s UE

Improved capacity utilization — Geographic demand matching

Reduced RF interference — Using non-interfering frequencies and radiation patterns

Improved throughput — Using tracking to reduce handoffs

Extended operational lifetime — Using Sunfleet® to stay current with new network developments

The shared vision of airborne networks is to extend or complement terrestrial networks which have incomplete or restricted coverage, extensive infrastructure, deployment challenges, limited bandwidth and poor resilience to natural disasters. High altitude airborne networks are particularly attractive and have the potential to provide universal, wide-area, disaster-proof, line-of-sight, persistent year-round coverage direct to mobile users, with minimal infrastructure. Furthermore, they can be readily deployable, easily upgraded and have lower cost to scale than terrestrial networks.

Aerial Networks — There is a long-standing demand for high-altitude long-endurance (HALE) UAVs, which could function as pseudo-satellites and provide broadband aerial communication links. These platforms could augment and potentially replace space-based communication satellites as cheaper, more responsive and potentially more capable platforms.

Ubiquitous and universal coverage is essential. 5G is not the answer, as it provides solutions only for high-density, urban areas. Neither is a complete solution provided by satellite communications, which require special equipment and face performance-limitations. The need for scalable solutions that can complement existing networks without additional infrastructure is becoming more urgent. Meanwhile, the best HALE solutions so far have been large and fragile fixed-wing platforms. However, their payload capacities are relatively small compared to their total weight, their costs tend to be very high, and their construction is very delicate and impractical for most military and commercial applications.

Sunlight Solution — Sunfleet Communication Networks are high-altitude, long-endurance, solar-powered airborne networks which provide universal, high-bandwidth global wireless connectivity at much lower cost than traditional tower or satellite networks.

Sunlight Aerospace has a new approach to HALE technology by exploiting formation flight in a new operational paradigm: a much better overall HALE performance can be achieved using multiple small platforms flown in close formation compared to a single large one. All or some of the payload can be partitioned into sections mounted on different UAVs and interconnected wirelessly to function as a single integrated payload. This approach is applicable not only to communications but other types of payloads too. As a result, a fleet of small UAVs has lower weight and power requirements and is more robust, economical and manufacturable than a single large aircraft.

Airborne networks have been proposed by Sunlight, Airbus, Google, Facebook amongst others. A common feature of the proposals is that communication hubs are located on unmanned aircrafts stationed in the Stratosphere, which is a sweet spot for performance and operations.

Sunlight’s competitors have proposed using single, very large unmanned aircraft to carry the hub functionality. Our assessment is that this approach is unrealistic within the foreseeable future without revolutionary technological advances. These also provide single points of failure and high mission risk. More advanced solutions, such as Sunfleet Networks, with better energy efficiency and redundancy are required to realize a true high-altitude airborne network, with full capabilities.

Sunfleet Networks are differentiated from the other airborne networks in that they will employ fleets of solar powered unmanned aircrafts with distributed systems and payloads. As a result of this distribution, Sunfleet aircrafts have lower weight and power requirements and can be smaller, more robust and more readily manufactured, than single aircraft solutions. This significantly reduces the mission risk. Sunfleet Networks will be the first to address all the major technology hurdles for year-round operation, payload capabilities, evolving network architectures and missions. The networks will be readily deployable, reconfigurable, cost-effective and seamlessly upgradable. They will have the flexibility to employ air-to-ground, air-to satellite, and/or air-to-air backhaul solutions, with RF or free-space-optical connections. These backhaul options will connect with, or be independent of, existing networks. The timing for Sunfleet Networks is opportune.

Satellite Constellations — Sunfleet networks can operate in conjunction with the existing and future satellite constellations.

Several companies are addressing satellite networks. We have identified potential hybrid Sunfleet-Satellite Networks, with reduced implementation risk and expanded markets. Satellites would provide the backhaul connectivity over wide latitudes, while Sunfleet Networks would provide direct to mobile customer connectivity at standard frequencies, with lower latency and better line of sight coverage. In addition, the capacity utilization could be improved using Sunfleet matching to geographic demand. RF interference with Geosynchronous satellites will not be an issue at Sunfleet frequencies. Communications throughput can be enhanced using Sunfleet to satellite handoffs. Satellite network lifetimes could also be extended by upgrading the Sunfleet layer. These benefits can be game changing, in terms of realization, capabilities, addressable markets and faster time to market.

Back to top