LOS ANGELES – Delair, a leading global supplier of commercial drone solutions, today announced the appointment of Michael Blondeau to the position of North American sales manager. Blondeau brings 15 years of piloting, training and commercial drone operational experience, and will be a key part of the team that is rapidly growing Delair’s presence in the North American market.
Blondeau’s experience includes more than 2,000 hours as pilot-in charge (PIC) of unmanned flights; several years with the US Army and military subcontractors managing aerial intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance missions; as well as a more recent role supporting commercial implementations of drone technology for surveying and mapping in industries such as construction, engineering, mining and agriculture. This deep understanding of geospatial use models, customer workflows, and regulatory issues will be key to assisting large North American enterprises in leveraging aerial intelligence to enhance their business efficiency, a critical element in Delair’s solutions strategy.
He will join a team of commercial drone experts that are supporting Delair‘s expanding customer base in North America, which has increased to represent more than 25% of the company‘s business. He will work directly with the Delair ecosystem of resellers, service operators, technology partners and end users to develop optimized solutions for specific use models and applications. Delair‘s combined hardware/software product offerings, based on its innovative and high performance fixed wings UAS and sophisticated analytics software, are transforming how businesses can efficiently obtain actionable business intelligence to optimize their operations.
Blondeau joins Delair from RDO Equipment Company, a pioneering and major commercial drone reseller in the US market, where he served as a technical account manager, advising clients on the use and integration of GPS technology and drone technology. Among his responsibilities were developing client workflows for aerial surveying, mapping, GIS, mining, agriculture and inspection applications. Blondeau is an experienced commercial flight trainer with extensive knowledge of issues such as FAA regulations, airspace management, remote sensing, data collection, data analysis.
“As we continue to grow the North American market with our solutions-oriented approach, it’s essential that we have the type of hands-on field experience in all aspects of UAS flight operations that Michael brings to us. His knowledge and understanding of best practices for flying long-range drone missions, particularly in the dynamic and evolving US market, will be an incredibly valuable asset as we help enterprises adopt the benefits of aerial-based digital asset monitoring and analysis,” said Benjamin Benharrosh, Delair’s co-founder and head of North American operations.
Prior to his role at RDO, Blondeau spent several years as test and instructor pilot at Northrop Grumman as part of the company’s UAS flight operations team. Here he completed advanced flight instructor certification programs and provided engineering support for testing and integration of new equipment. Before that he worked at ISR Group as a UAS pilot, directing long-range missions to perform aerial intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance. Prior to joining ISR, he served in the US Army as a UAS operator and also was trained on a variety of maintenance and operational procedures.
“The opportunity to proliferate UAS solutions to commercial users is a huge. I believe Delair is uniquely positioned to capitalize on this opportunity with the right technology and business model to bring high ROI value to customers. I am excited to apply my skills and experience to enterprises throughout the region and help them leverage the business benefits our offerings can deliver,” said Blondeau.
All of Delair’s solutions are designed to make it easy and cost-effective for enterprises to adopt commercial drones and support a seamlessly integrated workflow – from hardware to data acquisition services, to data processing software. This integrated approach enables commercial enterprises to automatically and instantly collect aerial intelligence, analyze and quickly integrate it into their daily business processes.
About DELAIR
Delair is a leading provider of drone-based solutions that enable enterprises to monitor and digitize their physical assets from the air and turn the collected data into valuable business insights. Its solutions are used globally by customers in industries such as utilities, construction, agriculture, transportation, mining and oil and gas. The company is one of the world’s most experienced providers of industrial drone solutions, combining its high performance, long range UAV hardware with sophisticated analytics technology and operational services. A strategic partnership with Intel and its Intel Insight initiative is driving the two companies toward the industry’s most scalable platform for drone imagery storage and business intelligence. Founded in 2011 by experts in the aerospace industry, the company is headquartered in Toulouse, France, and has offices in Ghent, Belgium, Los Angeles and Singapore. Its solutions are sold in more than 70 countries by a network of resellers. For more information about Delair and its brand-new generation of beyond-visual-line-of-sight (BVLOS) drones with 3G/4G communications, go to www.delair.aero and on twitter @DelairTech
