Sagetech Avionics Blasts Into the New Year Riding High on Its Accomplishments
January 2, 2024 | Dawn Zoldi
In this interview, Sagetech Avionics’ CEO Tom Furey outlines the company’s advancements in certified mission-critical transponders, software and related technologies in support of defense and civil general aviation, uncrewed aircraft systems (UAS) and electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) aircraft. Furey, a dynamic and hands-on executive with a passion for leading teams to breakout success in growth industries, walks us through the world of Sagetech’s groundbreaking low size, weight and power (SWaP) identify friend or foe (IFF) and ADS-B transponders, collision avoidance (ACAS) and detect and avoid (DAA) products that continue contributing to advancements in safe flight for dual-use missions and enabling beyond visual line of sight (BVLOS) operations in the commercial sector. Read on to learn more, not only about where Sagetech has been, but also to discover what we might expect from this innovative team in the new year!
Dawn Zoldi: Tom, you have an incredible background, including service in the United States Navy. Tell us a little bit more about that.
Tom Furey: Sure. After I graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy, I flew an airplane called the A6 Intruder and had a great time flying off of aircraft carriers. That experience taught me a lot about aerospace and sparked my passion for the defense and protection of our soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines. Then I went into a variety of industries – aerospace, manufacturing, engineering and general management – until I found my way into a company called Sagetech Corporation. That’s where I fell in love with the UAS industry. In 2019, we had the opportunity to acquire part of that company with partners and investors. We did and that’s how we started Sagetech Avionics. We just celebrated our fourth anniversary.
Dawn Zoldi: Talk to us about Sagetech Avionics. Who are you?
Tom Furey: Sagetech Avionics is a small business technology company. More than two thirds of the people in our company are engineers working on research, development and technical support of new products. We focus on aerospace safety. We’ve got a legacy of providing the world’s first and smallest aviation transponder, starting back to before I even got here, with the original company. We acquired those assets. So now we focus on providing civil certified and military IFF transponders, and collision avoidance solutions to enable BVLOS flight for civil UAS. Dawn Zoldi: At the company’s inception, what problem were you looking to solve?
Tom Furey: We decided to help mitigate potential risk. We were at the dawn of an era where we knew we were going to really start seeing airspace become more and more crowded with drones and eVTOLs. We recognized that these new entrants would need to work and play well with others in a much more complex traffic management environment. So we focused on creating solutions to enable safe flight on both the military and the commercial side.
Dawn Zoldi: Can you elaborate on the unique issues the military faces?
Tom Furey: Compared to 20 years ago, a drone flying around the battlefield was typically either ours or belonged to one of our close allies. Now, it’s really crowded combat airspace. Everybody’s got drones and they all look the same. We need to be able to correctly identify friend versus foe. We need to be able to recognize when there’s something that either isn’t or potentially isn’t one of our own, so we don’t shoot down our own assets and also can protect ourselves.
Dawn Zoldi: How does your technology help to solve that issue?
Tom Furey: Our MX12B IFF transponder was the first microtransponder that was certified for Mode 5 military IFF. I like to explain how it works using the game “Marco Polo.” A transponder, whether it’s a civil or military transponder, like the game, utilizes a challenge and a response. That’s what transponders have been since World War II. An air traffic controller on the ground interrogates by sending a radio frequency (RF) signal up to an aircraft (“Marco”) and the transponder in the aircraft automatically recognizes that signal and responds with the correct information about itself (“Polo”). These are traditional IFF interrogation/response modes. A new mode, Mode 5 Level 2B, doesn’t require interrogation, but rather aircraft continuously identify themselves as NATO/allied aircraft using something very much like encrypted ADS-B.
Dawn Zoldi: How is a traditional transponder different from ADS-B?
Tom Fuey: ADS-B doesn’t require a challenge. It automatically tells everybody who you are and where you are. I analogize ADS-B to “Horton Hears a Who” because it says “We are here, we are here, we are here.” You just have to listen and recognize that it is there.
Dawn Zoldi: How is military ADS-B different from the civil version?
Tom Furey: It’s almost exactly the same, except the military version, Mode 5 Level 2B,is wrapped in a super secret password through a crypto computer controlled by the NSA.
Dawn Zoldi: We’ll discuss civil transponders in a second, but tell us more about your military IFF transponder, the MX12B.
Tom Furey: When Mode 5 (which is like Mode S on the civil side except it’s encrypted) was mandated in 2020, we were the first microtransponder to be certified in early 2021. It’s the size of a deck of cards and weighs only about a third of a pound. When we released our MX12B that year, it was groundbreaking because it allowed militaries to put that Mode 5 IFF capability on drones for the first time. Dawn Zoldi: How does your IFF transponder compare to traditional ones?
Tom Furey: We like to call traditional IFF transponders “cinder blocks.” They were literally the size of a cinder block or at least half of one, weighed between 6-12 pounds and cost about a hundred thousand dollars.
Dawn Zoldi: Is the Department of Defense (DoD) using your IFF transponder for crewed aviation also?
Tom Furey: Yes. It suddenly hit them like, wait a minute, we’re paying more than twice as much as we need to and we’re wasting a lot of weight and space in our aircraft. And we could use this. Why limit this transponder to just UAS? So, it was not just groundbreaking by bringing the Mode 5 capability to small drones; it also turned out to be groundbreaking by saving valuable payload on crewed aircraft for other things like fuel, defensive armaments and other mission critical items.
Dawn Zoldi: Have you evolved the MX12B transponder since you first launched it?
Tom Furey: In June 2023, the MX12B became the first of any kind of transponder to be certified with Mode 5 Level 2 Broadcast, the encrypted ADS-B capability that allows aircraft to see each other without relying on air traffic control, as we discussed earlier.
Dawn Zoldi: What’s the impact of having Level 2 Broadcast capabilities?
Tom Furey: Across all the armed services, it provides a better situational awareness picture of the battlespace without the use of an interrogator. For example, a soldier can carry a version of the MX12B in their pocket, linked to a mobile device, and instantly understand if an aircraft or drone nearby is friendly. The receiver is passive, so it doesn’t broadcast its position like an interrogator, allowing broad use across all domains.
Dawn Zoldi: Let’s talk about the civil side. Tell us about what you’re doing in the ADS-B arena and how it can impact the future of the drone industry.
Tom Furey: As I said earlier, ADS-B allows all aircraft to see each other. It also allows everybody else on the ground to see them also. The FAA certified our ADS-B In and Out transponder in 2022. Ours was the first microtransponder to have both certified in the same box. We have a lab use interrogator version of that which interrogates other aircraft. As we talk about future products, we’re combining that with an ACAS-X collision avoidance logic. This will enable an all-in-one collision avoidance system. If you add in other sensors to pick up those people who don’t have ADS-B, such as radar or camera systems, this will enable a holistic detect-and-avoid (DAA) system. That’s our near-term goal, to have a dependable, reliable system that will enable the FAA to grant routine BVLOS waivers. Dawn Zoldi: Tell us more about ACAS.
Tom Furey: ACAS is an onboard traffic collision avoidance system that enables two aircraft to deconflict with each other to avoid a collision without requiring an air traffic controller to see them and to guide them. It was started to be developed in the 1950’s. It was not until 1981 that the FAA required it for use on commercial aircraft. Back then, it involved directional antennas that interrogated the airspace around it to see who else was out there. Once the system identified where that other aircraft was located, it would then provide information to the pilot, called a traffic advisory, to avoid that collision. It evolved later to provide a resolution advisory that not only told the pilot where the other traffic was; it also told the pilot what to do to avoid it. Even this improvement was limited. It only provided information to climb or descend. It didn’t tell the pilot to turn left or right. It also assumes the aircraft can climb at greater than 2500 feet per minute and fly at greater than 100 knots. Most drones and helicopters can’t do that. ACAS-X, developed by MIT and Johns Hopkins, essentially uses an aircraft’s track history and velocities to predict where both aircraft (yours and theirs) are going to be. It can handle any type of aircraft. And it doesn’t just tell you to climb or descend. It can tell you to climb, descend, turn left, turn right, slow down and can give you blended maneuvers around these things.
Dawn Zoldi: What ACAS-X products has Sagetech developed?
Tom Furey: Our new ACX family is a new hardware platform that will enable even more advanced transponder, IFF and ACAS X technology products. We have a prototype of a single circuit card version of the ACAS X family for drones. We also have a version with passive receivers for ground based airspace surveillance. It will also be able to recognize remote identification signals. Basically, it will be a one stop shop for airborne safety avionics and military IFF.
Dawn Zoldi: All of this makes for a compelling safety case, I would think, for BVLOS. Can you reveal any success stories along those lines?
Tom Furey: Our access ADS-B receiver and our ACAS-X situational awareness display along with a radar has received verbal approval for a groundbreaking waiver. I can’t say much other than this will be a pretty broad waiver, for a large area Concept of Operations (ConOps), which might be useful in commercial infrastructure inspection and things like that. The company whose aircraft it is will announce that when it is received. We’ve been working very hard to make sure things can be positioned for the FAA so they can see how these systems can enable that safety case. We’ve also been working with the ASSURE 54 program on test flights that will help to define the right of way rules for BVLOS flying.
Dawn Zoldi: You’ve accomplished much and have much on the table for 2024 already. What can we expect to see from Sagetech this year?
Tom Fure: More of the same, but different and better and faster. Our engineers developed this MX platform to be super capable but also flexible. It’s got a military certification. It’s got civil certification. We have interrogator versions that are being used for weather data through some research institutions. We’ll see further progress on ACAS and maybe even a product release next year, but definitely further progress and prototyping with customers on that. We’ll also continue to see ourselves working with the military to see how we can continue to advance technology and how technologies like Mode 5 be used in additional uncrewed systems, even smaller and lighter, like our ACX with a Mode 5 version on launched effects or loitering munitions.
Dawn Zoldi: How can people reach you?
Tom Furey: Our website is the easiest way to reach us. There’s a Contact Us page there. You can also find us on LinkedIn under Sagetech Avionics. And you can look for me, Tom Furey, on LinkedIn too. Find us, because we’d love to collaborate. I feel like 2024 is going to be the year of collaboration for this industry.
Watch Tom on the Dawn of Drones 2023 podcast: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wgGh76tNdp4
