My favorite Yogi Berra quote is, "When you get to a fork in the road, take it." As I've considered some of the opportunities we've pursued over the past year, I thought this quote was an appropriate lead-in to Rick's article in this issue.  

When we structured the business 15 months ago, we were focused on a different set of priority clients than we find ourselves pursuing today. Not that those clients are off our radar screen, but they no longer possess all the top spots on our priority lists.

We have come to many "forks" in our pursuit of business in the past year, and in many cases, agonized over which path provided the best opportunity because, due to our size, we could not pursue them all. In several cases, we ended up on the wrong path, but, undaunted, we addressed the lessons learned, made our way back and pressed on.

The contracts Rick describes here seem to be on "the road less traveled" (with credit duly noted to poet Robert Frost) for our type of business, but they have made us realize how important our persistence and willingness to take some risks have been in our pursuit of business opportunities.

We've done our best due diligence in making our choices, but Yogi's quote is not all that silly. Often it has been a SWAG* regarding the best path to pursue with the resources we have, and, fortunately for us, several, like those described here, have paid off.  

(* SWAG, for those who may not know, is a technical term meaning "Scientific Wild-Assed Guess.") 

ASSIST-U.S.® Expands into Marine Survey Market   

The ebb and flow of building a small business is full of challenges, surprises, and a lot of hard work. In other words, it is never dull. These last few weeks have elevated the business development bar at ASSIST-U.S.® and challenged us to consider several different opportunities. In many cases the surge of energy and activity associated with a new opportunity gives way to the realities of a small business enterprise... too little time and too few resources to accomplish every aspiration.

Certainly this is sometimes frustrating, but it is the "wins" that keep small business entrepreneurs coming back for more. For all of us at ASSIST-U.S.®, the successes of the last few weeks are a perfect example of how exciting and rewarding this adventure can be.   

Those of you who have followed our progress may recall that we collected some Right Whale footage off Cape Cod not too long ago.   

Right Whales Feeding off Cape Cod

It was this footage that initially introduced us to the folks at the New England Aquarium in Boston, MA. After we shared that video with them, their Right Whale research team analyzed it. They were able to identify some of the whales - including a cow and her calf -- and discuss in some detail the behavior they observed. They subsequently posted their analysis of our video on their blog. You can view that blog here. 

That pebble eventually started the rockslide that led to ASSIST-U.S.® formalizing an agreement this week with the NE Aquarium to provide flight services over the next year for a variety of marine aerial survey projects. This growing collaboration has led to another opportunity with Staten Island College in New York, again to provide aviation resources for a survey project.  

CESSNA 0-2A Skymaster

To facilitate both of these projects, ASSIST-U.S.® will be leasing a Cessna O-2A, also known at the Cessna Skymaster. 

Few aircraft are qualified for this type of work, since these surveys call for extensive over water operations and a long list of features so observers can perform their work. The O-2A comes close to a perfect fit. For the next year, ASSIST-U.S.® will carry observers on a series of flights over the waters south of Nantucket Island who will be recording marine life and boating activity.

What is most exciting about these new projects is their potential for growth into longer term research and aerial imagery programs. These programs could become a model for similar work across the country in other scientific disciplines. Marine sciences research was not a market we had originally identified for the company, so this is a very exciting venture for us.  It is also an opportunity for us to leverage our EnviroEye product, introduced last March. (Read more here about EnviroEye.)

Yet another opportunity that has begun to develop is in the world of "Orthorectified" aerial imagery. This technology is a fusion of innovative cameras and processing. Most often the finished product is used for GIS mapping, agricultural surveys, forest health surveys, and many other research and survey projects. ASSIST-U.S.® is now working with GeoVantage, Inc., of Peabody, MA, again as an aviation services provider (www.GeoVantage.com). Armed with a GeoVantage-designed and -manufactured camera system, ASSIST-U.S.® aircraft have already flown several hours of survey work in Massachusetts and Rhode Island.  

As we grow our business, it is sometimes hard to know which leads will turn into real work or which idea will become a reality. The one certainty that we can rely on is that every opportunity has potential for accelerating our growth to the next stage. 

ASSIST-U.S.® offers customized, real-time, daylight and infrared, streaming or archived aerial video imagery (in both standard and high definition formats) to support the unique, visual informational needs and capabilities of a diverse client base, including:

• marine science institutions
• environmental services agencies/firms
• public safety incident commanders (law enforcement/special operations
• mutual fire aid associations)
• utility company emergency response and security managers/directors
• insurance company disaster response teams and claims adjusters
• real estate agencies  
• and many others.  

ASSIST-U.S. Cessna 182P

These services help both public and private sector clients to prevent, mitigate, prepare for, respond to and recover from a wide variety of threats and vulnerabilities, whether from natural or man-made disasters, and to better serve their customer base with unique visual information.

Thanks for reading this update on our progress. Please don't hesitate to call any member of our team if you have questions or want more information, or check out our website and social channels.

Sincerely,

Carolyn Abbott, Director of Marketing Communications 

carolyn.abbott@assist-us.com