Recent Successes in Weather Technology Transfers

Matt Taylor, WSI AviationAugust 2015

Quick Look

• What’s a TRL?• Why Buy Weather?• WSI Tech Transfers• Challenges in Tech Transfer

What’s a Technology Readiness Level?

• Fundamental research to an operational in-use application.

• SBIR– Phase I - TRL 2– Phase II - TRL 3-5– Phase III - TRL 8 Acquisition or

Commercialization• Phase 3 ~ Kickstarter• Recognized difficulty in moving

from 6 to 8

What does this look like to Kickstarter?

• Overall 37% success rate for funding, 20% for tech• A third of all >$M funded projects are tech• Tech generally requires more money to fund

< $1000 $1000 to $9,999

$0k to $19K $20k to $99k $100k to $999k

>$1M0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

Percent of All Successfully Funded Kickstarter Projects by Funding Level

All Successful Projects

Technology Projects

How about Unsuccessfully Funded Kickstarters?

• Most unsuccessful projects receive minimal support• 8% of All Unsuccessful projects are tech,17% of all the pledged dollars are tech - tech takes more to fund

0% 1%-20% 21% to 40% 41% to 60% 61% to 80% 81% to 99%0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

Percent of Unsuccessfully Funded Kickstarter Projects by Funding Increments

All Unsuccessful Projects

Technology Projects

Axis Title

Why Buy Weather?

FAQ: Why do I need to buy this weather when I can get it for free?

• What does industry do?– Interface to Commercial Systems– Apply to Industrial Decisions - Data and Applications– Customize to Industry Unique Needs– Provide a Service Level Commitment

WSI Tech Transfer

• WSI Inflight - NASA cockpit weather R&D into Sirius commercial service

• Industry Adaptations: – WRF: WSI runs our own version globally– GTG: Implemented our own facsimile to 2.5 via

published works– HIWC: Relied on published works on the topic

• Total Turbulence - Roots in NASA that successfully transferred into a commercial patent

Industry Leading - WSI Inflight

Industry Supporting - Safe Flight 21, CAPSTONE, and ADS-B FIS-BIn the Capstone project, a 47% reduction in accidents was seen for

Capstone-avionics equipped aircraft

http://ipadpilotnews.com/2015/06/ads-b-weather-look-like/

https://buy.garmin.com/en-US/US/in-the-air/discontinued/mx20/prod9716.html#gallery-dialog

FAA Weather Related Funding

• Peaks and Valleys• Federal budget vs. Actuals• Program Reallocations

2015 2014 2013 2012 2011 2010 2009 2008 $-

$50,000,000 $100,000,000 $150,000,000 $200,000,000 $250,000,000 $300,000,000 $350,000,000 $400,000,000 $450,000,000

FAA Weather Related Funding via OFCM Annual Reports

Operations

Supporting ResearchAxis Title

Challenges in Tech Transfer

• The Premise of RTO is that there will be “R”• The attrition rate of “R” to “O” is high• Federal dollars for RDT&E

–Susceptible to the same budget constraints–Nearly 90% goes to large primes for R&D

•Ships, planes, and satellites are expensive–Organizational alignment between RDT&E and Ops