A civil UAV CEO who scales a drone business owns approval, safety, repeatable operations, B2B, and unit economics together — or the house withholds the seat. Not a chief pilot. Not a Chief Robotics Officer.
Christian Pobbig and Beyond Chiefs work from Hamburg on AI Executive Search in DACH. The file sits on the registered operator, not on the remote pilot.
Specific-category operators register themselves. Legal persons register in the Member State of their principal place of business (EASA, specific category). In Germany, competence follows the seat, not the flight site. The LBA takes applications directly for the listed Länder, independent of where the operation takes place. Page stand: 12 November 2025 (LBA, operating approvals).
The remote pilot is designated for the single flight. That person is not the company’s approval.
Miss one, and the house withholds the title. The law does not require a drone CEO.
Approval. Before specific-category flights the operator needs an operational authorisation from the NAA of registration, unless an EU STS or a LUC with privileges applies. An authorisation covers flights inside its limits and may cover an unlimited number of flights unless the NAA limits them (EASA). Issue of the authorisation is Article 12 of Regulation (EU) 2019/947. SORA is AMC 1 to Article 11 — the owner of the file, not a lesson. First applications until 31 December 2025 could use SORA 2.0 or 2.5; first applications from 1 January 2026 must use SORA 2.5. Existing SORA 2.0 approvals are extended only until 31 December 2027 (LBA).
Safety. The operator remains responsible for the safety of the operation — including in U-space a Member State may designate. Whether any U-space airspace is designated in Germany, Austria, or Switzerland: unknown. A USSP subscription does not replace the operator (EASA, U-space).
Repeatable operations. The operations manual is the operator’s document: what staff must know, including organisation, culture, and procedures. All communication on a first application is by the applicant, the registered UAS operator as holder of the e-ID. A consultancy may help; it does not speak for the operator. The form is signed by a person entitled to do so. Who that is in a GmbH: unknown (LBA, first application).
B2B. Commercial use is not automatically the specific category. If open-category conditions are met, no operating approval is required — that also holds for commercial operations (LBA, first application).
Unit economics. Cost per flight, utilisation, margin: unknown. The seat must own the P&L judgment. A figure does not belong on this page.
Only a legal entity may apply for a Light UAS Operator Certificate. Privileges scale with maturity and stay inside the terms of approval. The holder must show structured work: control of planning, implementation, maintenance, and back office; a LUC safety manual with roles and responsibilities. The highest privilege may be starting specific-category work without a fresh NAA authorisation. Optional. Not a blank check. Do not equate an accountable manager with the CEO (EASA, LUC).
Austria, dronespace: a LUC proves the operator can assess risk and complexity, put mitigations in place, and keep safety under control. An SMS must fit size and complexity. A generic operational authorisation is not an SMS. The SAIL line on that page is its contrast, not an EASA-wide threshold — and still not a P&L (dronespace.at).
EASA separates operator and remote pilot: the operator writes procedures if more than one remote pilot flies, designates the remote pilot for each operation, and stays inside the authorisation. The remote pilot flies inside the operator’s procedure. A LUC is “an organisational approval certificate” (EASA FAQ).
The LBA states that the estimated waiting time of an application until processing starts is, at present, clearly more than six months. The estimate is non-binding. Actual processing is, as a rule, a few working days. Change requests share the queue. Oversight of issued approvals is a statutory duty (LBA). That is not a volume and not an export to Austria or Switzerland. The live queue after 12 November 2025 as a number: unknown. Switzerland and BAZL were not opened here.
Certified category: the LBA says approvals are not currently possible for lack of legal prerequisites. Same page.
A live cell, its stop, and its safety case are a different contract. This seat holds the operator file of a civil drone business. Not a chief pilot. No weapons, no military detail.
The registered operator, holder of the e-ID. The remote pilot is named per flight, not the company.
No. The open category can carry commercial operations when its conditions are met.
No. Optional, bound to maturity, not a blank check, and not a statute for the title.
.webp)
