Michael Dekker
Tulsa World Business Reporter
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The first drone-testing facility of its kind in the world opened ceremoniously Thursday north of downtown Tulsa.
Swiss-based WindShape Inc. opened a 20,000-square-foot indoor facility where drones will be tested under extreme, but controlled, wind and weather conditions. It also will help validate a drone’s capabilities through data and will help private companies with evolving Federal Aviation Administration certification and flight rules, officials said.
The facility is located at Skyway Range, a drone testing area on the Osage Nation Reservation adjacent to its casino-hotel.
“We believe that drones are on their way to changing the world,” said Guillaume Catry, WindShape’s co-founder and CEO. “We think they will play an important role in agriculture, in law enforcement, defense” and other areas.
The company was founded about 10 years ago in Geneva and now has about 30 employees. So far, only three are at the Tulsa testing facility, but that number is expected to double in the coming months, said Steve Cole, director of the facility.
WindShape’s signature technology is referred to as “wind walls,” in which hundreds of tiny fans are mounted within what resembles a huge, black bookcase.
A 12-by-16-foot such device — the largest built so far — was used to show a crowd of more than 100 dignitaries and journalists how it works.
It has 1,700 small fans that can be individually controlled, creating virtually any kind of wind conditions.
A drone is flown in front of the wind wall to measure its performance and tolerances under the various conditions.
The facility — which was converted from an old storage hanger — also has a “snow room,” in which snow and ice are created in temperatures well below zero during a drone flight. It also has a similar “rain room.”
Catry said WindShape choose Tulsa for its one-of-a-kind testing facility because of the collaboration among the Osage Nation, civic and private leaders, and the Oklahoma Department of Commerce.
“It’s a central location in the United States and … so many people here have been so great with everyone working together,” he said.
The company’s landing in Tulsa was spearheaded in large part by Tulsa Innovation Labs, a tech economic development nonprofit.
TIL also led the effort to secure a $51 million federal grant designating the city as a “tech hub” in 2023, helping to expand many collaborations and programs related to tech entities in Tulsa.
“WindShape’s presence here can multiply … those efforts in attracting more innovation to Tulsa,” said Jennifer Hankins, managing director of TIL.
Also helping land WindShape to Tulsa were Oklahoma State University and Jamey Jacob, professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering and director of the Unmanned Systems Research Institute — or drone program — at OSU. His research has been ongoing for years.
In 2024, then-Tulsa Mayor G.T. Bynum held a news conference touting a year’s worth of work to make Tulsa the “drone capital of the world.”
Cole told the Tulsa World investment in the facility is several million dollars.
WindShape’s customers will run the gamut — from university researchers studying dolphins to weather to package delivery and to military and law enforcement applications, in which active shooters could be identified, for example, Cole said.
The company is aiming to provide drone-testing services for not just entities in the U.S. but around the world, Catry said.
business@tulsaworld.com
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Michael Dekker
Tulsa World Business Reporter
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