Multinational law firm Hogan Lovells has hired unmanned aircraft systems advocate Gretchen West, who will provide business and regulatory consulting to the firm’s clients who use or seek to use drones commercially.
West, a nonlawyer with an MBA, joins the firm’s Silicon Valley government regulatory practice as senior advisor for innovation and technology. She joins from commercial drone software startup DroneDeploy, where she was vice president of business development and regulatory affairs. She expects to work quite a bit with Hogan Lovells’ clients in the energy, agriculture and mining industries.
Prior to DroneDeploy, West spent over a decade as executive vice president of the Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International, an Arlington, Va.-based non-profit advocacy organization for the unmanned systems and robotics community. Her work at Hogan Lovells will also include lobbying on behalf of clients and the drone industry.
West said she and the rest of the drone business community were eagerly awaiting the Federal Aviation Administration’s next set of guidelines, due for release by June 2016. She said commercial drone users were hoping the FAA would release guidelines allowing for one operator to fly multiple drones simultaneously and allowing for drones to be flown beyond an operator’s line of sight and over more populated areas.
The FAA, she said, “has been known to miss deadlines. We and others in the industry will continue to pressure them to get that rule out on time.”
Source: The Recorder
[Gretchen will also serve as Master of Ceremonies for Drone World Expo, being held in San Jose on November 17-18]