[Benclaman]

We're not planning to build something that's 600 feet long and costs hundreds of millions, we're building something that's 60 feet long and costs hundreds of thousands. Unmanned blimps of this size don't require the same amount of capital, so we can fly faster and get to market faster.

[elihu]

Supposing you had unlimited engineering resources and development or capital costs weren't an issue, are smaller blimps fundamentally superior to larger ones in some important way? For instance, are smaller blimps inherently faster or easier to control in windy conditions?

[uncoder0]

Very good answer. The key difference is the size it also offers you much more flexibility it would seem in terms of the role you can fill. You can always add more blimps.

[traceroute66]

But do you escape the regulatory requirements and the practical constraints ?

[joefigura]

We'll spend a lot of time on certification. We need two things: a type-certification of the aircraft, and operator certifications for the organizations flying them. Both require a lot of flight hours, which will be our main development activity. There's no escaping aircraft regulation, but we have a clear path

Hopefully we've responded to practical constraints in other answers, but if not let me know questions.

[ramesh31]

> we're building something that's 60 feet long and costs hundreds of thousands.

Why still hundreds of thousands? Blimps are an incredibly simple, cheap technology, and drone hardware is completely commoditized at this point.