KFRToad,thanks for the post, I've done some poking around your site and the brochure and here are some thoughts:
First, I completely agree with your vision for startup and expansion. I think too often, companies get overly ambitious and they present unrealistic timelines. But getting to the concept, I really like it and I think you have real potential, especially in Africa. While I personally do not have any experience on that continent, my analysis tells me that you could propose your autogiro as sort of a jack of all trades law enforcement/observation/rescue system. I think that as an asset for a local government, this could be used to patrol borders, look for poachers and criminals, as well as spot troubles such as natural disasters. Additionally, as a medical/rescue response, the craft could carry a doctor and or recover an ill person, very useful for remote areas where limited medical coverage may exist.
What I would recommend is creating a short inexpensive video of the TOAD inside of a fabric type hangar, pull it out, start the engine, show the quick launch, have the aircraft flyover a road stretch, land and refuel from a 55 gallon drum. Takeoff again, receive a “distress call,” land next to a house, pick up a sick person, then land back next to a waiting ambulance and finally push it back in the hangar. I would also put together the “system price” of the aircraft, some NVG’s, a handheld GPS, and the little hangar and tell folks, for XX price, you can have this and be operational. While you can obviously load up a high quality (and expensive) EO/IR system, you now are falling into the trap of your higher end competitors by loading it up with gizmos.
For military purposes, I do like the idea of a convoy driving with it on a trailer and launching it to scout ahead. You are correct to compare to the UAV market because I think the whole issue of bandwidth for download of both the video and to control the craft is saturating frequencies. I also really like the idea of it’s simplicity but I think using the Afghan scenario is problematic. While the ceiling of 4,500 meters could work in parts of the south and western Afghanistan, the terrain in the rest would give you trouble. Once again, I think Africa would be a good area to show as a customer.
If you got ambitious (and some funding) paint one in a haze grey colour, show two crew members with personal body armor and a EO/IR system and have it fly over and video some people gatherings or buildings. I’m not necessarily sold on making it into some armed platform but once again as an observation/resupply/medevac tool, it could be quite useful. The extraction of a person or piece of gear is the part that the UAV does not bring to the table.
Good luck and let us know if you have any success!