Rise of the Airship Drones

I'm excited to announce that Seth Levine, partner and co-founder at Foundry Group, will be a guest on my podcast next week. If you have any questions you'd like me to ask him, please share them here. I'll make sure to include your questions in our conversation! Additionally, listeners with questions will be invited to join me live in future episodes.

Growing up, I was fascinated by airships. The idea of taking to the skies in one of those stately, floating giants captivated my imagination. But as I got older, I learned that airships disappeared for good reason - they were unsafe, inefficient, and impractical.

So when I met Janne while I was at Slush last year, I was intrigued but skeptical. How could you overcome all the challenges that doomed airships nearly a century ago?

To find out, I spoke with Janne Hietala, co-founder of the startup Kelluu several times. What I learned surprised me - with 21st century technology like hydrogen power, autonomous flight, and advanced materials, airships may have a second chance to transform transportation and logistics.

In this episode, Janne provides an inside look at how Kelluu is engineering next-generation airships and using them to collect valuable aerial data.

Janne Hietala's background:

• Seasoned entrepreneur with multiple exits, no formal engineering background

• Strong technical expertise in areas like programming and hacking

• Co-founded and grew an international SaaS company acquired by PE

• No family entrepreneurship history, learned online from mentors

• Joined Kelluu as co-founder after short retirement, seeking new challenge

Key facts about Kelluu

Kelluu is a Finnish startup that has developed autonomous and hydrogen-powered airships to collect high-resolution aerial data.

• Its airships can stay aloft for long durations (up to 10x longer than drones) and operate in challenging weather conditions. This enables stable, frequent data collection.

• The airships are filled with hydrogen rather than helium. Hydrogen provides more lift but requires special safety considerations that Kelluu has engineered solutions for.

• The business model is data-as-a-service. Kelluu collects aerial data using its patented airship platforms, then processes it into 3D digital twins, AI training data, and other products.

• Customers span industries like infrastructure, forestry, urban planning, and more. The frequent high-resolution data supports use cases from power line inspection to modeling city environments.

• Kelluu has an expert team of engineers, manufacturers, operators, and data scientists. They iteratively solved hard technical problems related to materials, flight control, hydrogen handling, and autonomy.

• Origins trace back to two founders tinkering in a Finnish barn over 5 years ago. The company has evolved from homemade prototypes to now mass manufacturing its airship designs.

Kelluu's team

Entrepreneurs Jouni Lintu and Jiri Jormakka established Kelluu. Alongside them, Janne, an entrepreneur known for his ability to transform complex concepts into reality despite lacking a formal engineering background, also played a pivotal role as a co-founder of the company

• Iterative development from small Finnish barn beginnings

• Multidisciplinary team spanning manufacturing, operations, software, aerospace engineering

• Advisors like ex-NASA astronaut provide guidance

• Combines strong technical engineering with creative diversity

Finnish Startup Ecosystem

Janne sees a strong entrepreneurial spirit in Finland but identifies a few key gaps holding back startup success:

• Lack of late stage VC funding to scale globally

• Engineering strength, sales and marketing weakness

• Tendency to bootstrap rather than aggressively pursue growth capital

• Geographic distribution challenges outside major hubs

He believes Finland has the talent to build major startups with the right funding partners and promotional mindset. Access to experienced capital at key stages remains the biggest obstacle to compete with other startup ecosystems. But examples like Supercell prove Finns can create global category leaders.

Work-life balance

Janne acknowledges that maintaining work-life balance as a startup founder is very difficult. There is a constant struggle not to overwork, especially when you love what you do.

• Important to care for physical and mental health to avoid burnout

• Self-care activities crucial, though hard to focus on in critical times

• Janne acknowledges room for improvement in his own work-life balance

• Overworking is an occupational hazard for entrepreneurs

• Striking the right equilibrium is a constant battle

Overcoming early doubts and flawed advice

Janne shared how he gave up his first startup idea after negative feedback from potential investors who said it wouldn't work.

• It's natural to be more influenced by outside views when young

• With experience, he gained conviction to ignore flawed advice

• Skepticism from instant experts should not deter novel ideas

• Wishes he had more stubbornness and willingness to dismiss bad advice earlier

• Overcoming early doubts requires confidence, persistence, and selectivity

Kelluu's journey shows that groundbreaking innovation often comes from reviving old concepts with fresh eyes. While airships faded away decades ago, they may now be rising to new heights.

The allure of the airship still lingers in my heart. But thanks to startups like Kelluu, I can now picture them cruising the skies once again - not as relics of the past, but as innovative platforms of the future.