New autonomous flight startup says the sky will soon be filled with pilotless planes
Merlin Labs, the Tesla of planes
Aviation technology startup Merlin labs recently announced they’ve secured $25 million in funding for the development of their pilotless planes.
The company recently struck a deal with aviation services contractor Dynamic Aviation, with potential to expand their tech to commercial flights.
“What we’re working on is creating a truly autonomous digital pilot”
Merlin Labs CEO Matt George
As part of this deal, Merlin Labs will supply its autonomous flight technology to 55 of the contractor’s King Air aircraft. The company says it’s already conducting test flights with the first King Air plane.
Merlin Labs CEO Matt George said the company’s goal is to be able to fly planes totally unmanned. The new technology will use enable existing aircraft to “fly autonomously,” he said.
How does the technology work?
The autonomous flight technology that allows Merlin’s aircraft to fly without a pilot is pretty simple, George says.
“The reason that that autonomy up in the air is so much easier is that you have complete vision, at least in the United States, of everything that’s up in the sky, with ground based radar,” he said.
Merlin says it envisions the role of remote pilots as supervisory, monitoring dozens of aircraft in the sky at once. George says the “vast majority of tasks” will be left to autonomous software, including communication with air traffic control and navigation.
Merlin Labs “doesn’t believe in remote piloting”. If the aircraft loses signal with the remote operator, then you would have “a huge chunk of metal hurtling through the sky,” he told The Verge.
It may come as a surprise that this autonomous flight technology is not quite as new as it seems. It’s actually quite common for planes to have some level of autopilot capability.
Natasha is an Associate Producer at ticker NEWS with a Bachelor of arts from Monash University. She has previously worked at Sky News Australia and Monash University as an Online Content Producer.
Tech giant Microsoft is facing increasing pressure to publish its tax data with investors demanding transparency
Investors who are managing more than $350 billion of the company’s assets want access to further financial information.
It comes as tech giants globally face growing scrutiny over their tax affairs.
Investors are demanding that Microsoft publish more transparent tax and financial information, as tech giants face growing scrutiny globally over their tax affairs.
A shareholder resolution on tax transparency had been filed to Microsoft ahead of its annual investor meeting this year.
The organiser of the action is UK-based proxy advisers Pensions & Investment Research Consultants.
FILE PHOTO: A smartphone is seen in front of the Microsoft logo in this illustration photo taken July 26, 2021. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo
Taxation transparency
Investors including Nordea, AkademikerPension and Greater Manchester Pension Fund had backed the resolution.
The resolution calls on the company to publish financial and tax information on a country-by-country basis outside its home market of the United States.
The investors want to know whether Microsoft is paying fair taxes and identify any risks posed by tax reforms.
It also calls on Microsoft to produce a tax transparency report in line with the tax standard of the Global Reporting Initiative, a standards organisation.
Microsoft waa not immediately available for comment.
It comes as Microsoft revealed Russian government hackers carried out multiple cyber operations against Ukraine.