Sesame Solar, Target Arm and AG3 Labs package drones with the renewable grid that recharges them

A drone is coming back to a forward site on a low battery, and someone has to recover it. Jeffrey A. McChesney, founder and chief executive of Target Arm, described that person as "someone standing in the open, waiting on an aircraft," and said launch and recovery are "two of the most exposed moments of a drone mission" ^[6]. The next battery has its own risk. "If a forward expeditionary team can't power its drones, or their batteries fail from heat or cold, warfighters lose one of their most valuable assets," said Lauren Flanagan, chief executive and co-founder of Sesame Solar ^[4].

The pitch is persistence. Target Arm's drone magazines cycle aircraft through deployment for what the companies call 24/7/365 coverage ^[8]. According to the companies' release, as reported by Interesting Engineering, the product is Sesame Solar's self-generating mobile power, Target Arm's arm and magazines, and AG3 Labs' attritable aircraft wired into one system for training and forward use ^[1]. Operators monitor the grid's energy performance remotely and control the arm and drones from a distance ^[2].

Flanagan also put electricity on the supply list. "Mobile electric power is a critical fifth supply requirement along with food, water, munitions, and fuel," she said ^[3]. We think she is right about where forward teams are short. If power is a supply line, a unit should test it as hard as it tests the airframes.

AG3 Labs co-founder Nick Smock described the payoff. "Put that on a system that launches, recovers and recharges itself, and you have persistent capability without adding a single person to the team," he said ^[13]. Forward units fly the sorties the mission demands, in whatever month and weather the site has. A grid that makes its own renewable power has to keep pace when generation drops. The companies' release does not include a generation rating, a storage capacity, a count of drones per magazine or a price.

The power side is sold by the unit, like the drones. A Nanogrid comes standalone or in a series of two to twelve, forming a turnkey MIL-STD mobile microgrid that can also charge man-portable batteries and other forward equipment ^[10].

In our view, a unit should judge the Nanogrid as a power purchase first and the drones second. The tradeoff is a slower decision on the airframes. A 2x2 sorts most units. One axis is why drones sit on the ground today: for want of charge, or for want of airframes and operators. The other is whether fuel reaches the site reliably or through a contested line. Grounded for charge on a contested line is the case the three companies built for. Grounded for charge with steady fuel puts the Nanogrid up against a generator. A unit short of airframes on a contested line would use the grid to charge man-portable batteries, and the drones become a separate buy. Short of airframes with steady fuel, there is little here for that unit.

For the first box, the number to get is sorties per day per Nanogrid in the site's worst month. Divide the mission's daily sortie need by that figure and you get the number of Nanogrids. A result above twelve means one array will not cover the site ^[10].