Co-founder and CEO of Athlon Avia, Artem Vʼyunnyk, shared his thoughts on what solutions are currently being adopted and what problems manufacturers are facing.
Co-founder and CEO of Athlon Avia, Artem Vʼyunnyk, shared his thoughts on what solutions are currently being adopted and what problems manufacturers are facing.
«Today we adopt one thing, tomorrow we buy another, then something else appears,» he said in an interview with Forbes. Thus, according to him, buyers are taking the bottom out of many manufacturers, «so as not to offend anyone.»
«The result is a zoo of solutions in the Armed Forces of Ukraine for which there is no support, training, etc.,» added the co-founder of Athlon Avia.
In addition, he noted that it is not enough to manufacture, because the product itself is only 20% of success. The next important part is training, in particular, when it comes to UAVs, it is primarily instructors and operators. And also repair.
Among the main problems in the industry, Artem Vyunyk named selection without analysis of feedback from a large number of users, that is, the lack of a data-driven approach. «And if 100 people say that it’s class, then it’s class. 100 people say that it’s crap, then it’s crap,» he explains, speaking about information from the military on the battlefield, on the basis of which the General Staff forms an assessment of the product. According to the co-founder of Athlon Avia, such an approach is logical at the first stage of selection.
The three co-founders of Athlon Avia, Artem Vʼyunnyk, Oleksiy Gogin, and Tychinskyy Kostyantyn, started working in a garage on their knees in 2013. And within a year, the specialists officially registered the company, and in July 2014, the first official report from the military on the testing of the first aircraft was released. The company’s flagship was the Furia drone, designed to adjust artillery fire.
«Fury» was the first product to undergo official testing in the Armed Forces at all. Then «Athlon Avia» actually became the first private company whose drones were accepted into service.
Before the full-scale invasion, Athlon Avia was producing about 25 Furia A1-SM complexes per year. Considering that the complex includes three aircraft, the company produced about 75 aircraft.
At the end of August, Athlon Avia introduced the sequel to the legendary drone, Fury-2. The new model is significantly larger than its predecessor. We wrote here about what was known about the new version of Fury, which was first seen in September 2024.
As of September 2024, the company was producing 150 sets of serial products per month. Currently, the company produces at least 200 aircraft per month. Currently, Athlon Avia’s capacities are fully loaded until the end of March. The company is also ready to scale up and is talking about the possibility of shipping 600 in six months.
Almost half a year ago, the team had about 200 people. Currently, the team has 250 people. And if production increases, they can increase the team.
