High Lander has joined STEP, an American investment fund based in Houston, Texas, focused on companies in the UxS and C-UAS space.
“Co-exhibiting from a shared pavilion at Airspace World in Lisbon, the entities announced the alliance, which establishes High Lander as the definitive software backbone for STEP’s ecosystem of operations,” said the companies in a press release.
STEP assembles a portfolio of synergistic, interoperable companies spanning aerial, ground, and maritime domains, acting as an accelerator for the full-spectrum autonomous systems industry. “Within this ecosystem, each portfolio company strengthens the others, and High Lander’s software serves as the operational layer for the aerial domain, managing, coordinating, and deconflicting all UAV operations across the ecosystem,” according to the companies. “The ecosystem’s focus on the high-growth U.S. aviation market leverages these software solutions to orchestrate macro-level airspace management alongside complex fleet operations.”
High Lander provides the airspace and mission management for the STEP ecosystem through its specialized software suite. Vega UTM delivers next-generation uncrewed traffic management, providing aviation authorities and managers with the automated strategic and tactical deconfliction required for unified airspace.
Complementing this, Orion Drone Fleet Management acts as the hardware-agnostic platform for automated flight execution, allowing operators to control and scale complex, multi-drone missions. Together, these platforms form the operational core of the ecosystem, bridging the gap between localized drone operations and airspace safety.
“The future of aviation relies on a fully integrated sky where crewed and uncrewed aircraft operate in harmony,” said Alon Abelson, CEO and co-founder of High Lander. “By embedding our software into the STEP ecosystem and showcasing this architecture together here in Lisbon, we are providing the essential digital infrastructure needed to manage complex airspaces safely and at scale. This collaboration provides a direct path for operators and municipalities to transition from isolated testing to sustained, high-density drone operations.”
High Lander is already utilizing its active deployment in Tulsa as a proof point for US market entry.
The live operations in Tulsa serve to validate real-world scalability under dense flight conditions, proving how automated flight plan approvals and real-time telemetry tracking operate natively within American municipal and industrial landscapes. The company embeds C-UAS security into its deployments, synthesizing data from disparate radar and sensor arrays into a unified airspace picture. This architecture also ensures alignment with evolving FAA frameworks, says the company. High Lander’s platforms are optimized for current Part 107 standards while structurally anticipating upcoming Part 108 regulations governing Beyond Visual Line of Sight (BVLOS) operations.
For more information
www.highlander.io.
www.stepworld.com
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