Longitude Mobility
Transfoming Organ Transportation and Logistics

Longitude Mobility is transforming the transportation of human organs to critically ill patients by modernizing outdated logistics models with precise delivery times, constant communication and real-time visibility. It collaborates with medical aviation firms to enhance competitiveness, streamline operations and align services with the specific needs of transplant centers and surgeons.

Saverio La Francesca, Founder and Principal Consultant, highlights the potential of innovative technology in this field. “While electric aircraft developers predict that their designs will be less expensive to operate than fossil-fueled ones, the cost of transport could be reduced further by eliminating the need for a pilot on certain trips through autonomous, remotely piloted drones.”

This vision reflects Longitude’s approach to offering costeffective alternatives across the entire organ transportation process, from ground and flight operations to booking, aimed at making organ and tissue transport quicker, safer, seamless, sustainable and more affordable.

Optimizing logistics for transporting hearts, lungs, livers and kidneys, Longitude is contributing to saving more lives. It delivers procurement, access, logistics and cost efficiencies, enabling faster surgeries and shorter wait times. Looking ahead, it is also preparing for the next generation of transportation solutions, such as drones and VTOL (vertical take-off and landing) aircraft.

La Francesca brings to Longitude his decades of experience as a cardiovascular and transplant surgeon, having performed over 10,000 surgeries during a career spanning over 30 years at prestigious institutions like the Texas Heart Institute and Stanford. He has overseen organ procurement and transport systems for the Thoracic Transplant Program at Stanford and served as a procurement surgeon at Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital. Currently, La Francesca is a Principal Cardiothoracic Surgeon at TransMedics. This medical technology company transports organs in portable mini-laboratories that preserve them during transit through impeccable temperature control and timely circulation of blood or oxygen.

His deep expertise in every stage of the organ transplant process—from identifying donors to ensuring optimal conditions in flight—gives him a comprehensive understanding of the challenges transplant teams face. Combining his clinical background with executive leadership experience, La Francesca is passionate about improving organ transportation logistics, where inefficiencies can often be the difference between life and death.

An example of this innovation is the work of Unither Bioelectronics, which, in September 2021, successfully transported donor lungs between two Toronto hospitals using a drone. This brand-new flight, where lungs were delivered via drone for the first time in history, demonstrated how drone technology can significantly improve the efficiency of organ transfers, particularly in congested urban areas. The flight, a result of years of research and development, was a collaboration between United Therapeutics CEO Martine Rothblatt and Unither’s VP of Organ Delivery Systems, Mikaël Cardinal.

This milestone highlights the potential for future advancements in organ transportation, proving that drone technology can maintain the necessary conditions for organs and effectively coordinate with medical teams to save lives. As drone technology continues to evolve, Longitude Mobility promises to further revolutionize how life-saving organs are delivered, ultimately improving access and outcomes for transplant patients worldwide.