Founder Spotlight - Skyfarer

Today, on the series of "founder spotlights" by Plug and Play UK , we turn our attention to Elliot Parnham , the founder and CEO of Skyfarer? LTD .

Here are some of the responses to the questions we posed:

1) What is Skyfarer?

Skyfarer started in 2017 as an idea generated following his first degree, and a desire to fill his time with something exciting, rewarding and fulfilling. Started as a drone manufacturer focusing on medical delivery, they have evolved into a market leading operator of multiple drones in multiple industry’s – removing complexity and filling the void of drone use with simplicity. They are now focusing on providing Drones as a Service, removing the burdens of training, compliance, management, CapEx and maintenance from the customer, and making drones accessible to all organisations.

2) What is Elliot’s background before and how long have you

He had his sights set on the RAF ever since he was in his early teens at school. He shaped his academic journey on getting into the RAF, first being unsuccessful at Officer selection when he was 15 years old, which led him to do his A-Levels and then go to University to study Aerospace engineering. He joined the University Air Squadron local to his and found out very quickly he did not like being told what to do! A massive blow that sent him into a depressing second year of uni, but led to him trying industry with an engineering role in Triumph Motorcycles. Here, he felt confined and boxed in, despite the positive workplace camaraderie – so he tried everything in his final year of uni and discovered entrepreneurship at the end. That was in 2017, when he came up with the idea for Skyfarer and started to build the business – he went on to do his Masters in Astronautics and Space engineering at Cranfield, whilst building the business, working part time as an Argos van driver, then he worked in Project Management for a big UK Catapult centre in Aerospace Defence and Security. Finally he was able to employ himself, employee number 4 for Skyfarer at the time and the rest is history!

3) What is Skyfarer’s WHY"?

Mainly, many wrong paths and failures, many depressions and slumps led to him doing what he is doing today and led to the creation of Skyfarer. The morale of that story is throw yourself in without worrying about the potential outcomes – because even a failure is a massive success in your personal growth and focusing what it is you really want to do. For him, he feels like he aged 30 years even in his teens because of this (and for having an older aged father), and he quickly found out that fulfilment should be at the core of what he spends his time on – making something beneficial to society and leaving a legacy then became his ambition and drives him still to make a success out of Skyfarer.

4) Challenges Faced and Overcoming Them?

1. Raising funds and cash flow is always very difficult for an innovative startup – they have been in the situation multiple times, where they were at a knife edge, a big low, where you think all is lost. But persevering through that is so important because oftentimes, a pick-me-up is just around the corner – they have always found a way out of difficult situations.?

• Number 2 – it is always super easy to hire, and the opposite to let go. He surrounded himself at the start with people he liked as friends more than anything else – although they achieved great things, it meant the business outgrew many that were involved early on. Conversations of friends/employees moving on is always difficult, but in fact is possibly the best thing for everyone involved – out of difficulty often comes massive learning and prosperity.
• Number 3 – remaining tenacious in the face of adversity. This he sees as critical and one of the biggest challenges. Nowadays he sees being a founder or entrepreneur as less of a job and more of a lifestyle and a way of being, and he thinks for any budding entrepreneurs, a foundation of knowledge is important but also a foundation of strength of mind is also increasingly important (somewhat Stoic in mindset, but also present and calm). There are many ways to obtain strength of mind, confidence, robustness and tenacity – he does a lot of them, from cold showers, stretching, meditation, reading world class books such as “How to win friends and influence people”, listening to influential people such as Alan Watts, having a hobby or working out regularly – all of which need discipline which is also important as a founder.

5) What is the Future for Health-tech Innovations?

He cannot speak for the most part on health-tech innovations as he is not a medical expert; Skyfarer is supporting health innovation more so than a complex medical device or suchlike. But he can say that generally, the perception on health tech is super positive and supportive – the vast majority are excited by innovations that will stop suffering and support society and people. That makes it easy and exciting to talk about what they do as health innovators, and rally support for its growth generally. There are also developing mechanisms for trialling and testing health-tech and accelerators and incubators such as Plug and Play Health tech accelerator that provide connections, tools, mentorship and learning to take massively impactful innovations through idea to trial to market.

6) How has Plug and Play UK helped?

• Plug and Play more than anything so far has been a great opportunity to connect with founders – and being a founder can often be a lonely experience, so talking with other founders is often very uplifting.
• The mentors and connections already through Plug and Play have been phenomenal – they have such a huge connection of incredible people across the world in multiple sectors.
• The webinars and workshops have also been of a new calibre to what he has seen before, super engaging and very insightful.