sUAS News

Indianapolis, IN Indiana drone startups Pierce Aerospace, a leading Remote ID UAS Service Supplier (RID-USS), and DRONEDEK LLC, a leading smart mailbox company, have teamed to advance commercial drone delivery. The collaboration unites Pierce Aerospace’s Remote Identification expertise and technologies and DRONEDEK’s patent portfolio in last-mile logistics, including a drone mailbox system. The teams’ combined […]

The FAA released the long-awaited proposed rule on UAS remote identification on December 26. While the proposal includes some elements that we advocated for, there are several concerning elements as well. We will need everyone’s help to ensure that the final rule on remote ID works as best as possible for our community. For years, […]

I told anyone who was listening that the remote ID (#RID for the folks on the socials) that this was an FAA ruse to put one over on the kiddies. The FAA gave everyone the “our hands are tied by DHS” hogwash, and they want RID (privacy, safety, data, detect and avoid, yadda, yadda, yadda), […]

Gadfin design and develops long-range Urgent-delivery systems of the future, which is no less than a game-changer for the Medical and Time-critical deliveries market. Our system brings together traditional flight knowledge, unmanned and autonomy technology, thus redefining delivery capabilities in terms of flight radius, safety, reliability, and automation, that is going to disrupt the world. […]

Deliveries take flight in the U.S. In April, Wing became the first drone operator to be certified as an air carrier by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). With its expanded Air Carrier certificate, Wing’s permissions are the first to allow multiple pilots to oversee multiple unmanned aircraft making commercial deliveries simultaneously to the general public. This paved […]

First, let’s quickly park a couple of things. The best drone of this decade, I think there can only be one choice, 2013’s DJI Phantom. It was the airframe that fired the imagination of many folks and bought them into the business. It’s genius in my opinion laid in a tidy design, curves not angles […]

Kleos Space S.A (ASX:KSS, Frankfurt:KS1, Kleosor Company), a space-powered Radio Frequency Reconnaissance data-as-a-service (DaaS) company, provides the following update sent to all shareholders of the Company who have provided the Company’s share register with email addresses. Kleos has received confirmation, following the successful launch of PSLV 47 (27thNov) and PSLV 48 (11thDec), that the Kleos Scouting Mission will launch on […]

BROOKINGS – Engineering students at South Dakota State University are designing a drone large enough to carry a human for their capstone senior design project, with help from a nearly $80,000 grant from NASA. “NASA wants to address specific topics, one of which is related to innovation in aeronautic transportation,” explained assistant mechanical engineering professor […]

Ground control station GCS hardware refers to the complete set of ground-based hardware systems used to control the UAV. This typically includes the Human-Machine Interface, computer, telemetry, video capture card and aerials for the control, video and data links to the UAV. Smaller UAVs can be operated with a traditional “twin-stick” style transmitter,as used for radio-controlled […]

PABLO AIR successfully conducted a long-distance drone delivery from Seogwipo Port on Jeju Island to Cheonjin Port on Wudo Island on November 2, 2019, ushering in an era wherein delivery services can be received via drone anywhere. The drone is considered an iconic concept of the 4th Industrial Revolution, and the competition to introduce drone in the […]

Dusty Robotics, developer of robot-powered automation for the construction industry, today announced that it has closed a $5 million seed round led by NextGen Venture Partners and joined by returning investors Baseline Ventures, Root Ventures, and Cantos Ventures. The financing brings Dusty’s total funding to date to $7.2 million. Founded in 2018 by seasoned robotics […]

FAA Rule For Remote Identification Intends To Bolster Safety, Security And Accountability DJI, the world’s leader in civilian drones and aerial imaging technology, is reviewing today’s proposed rule from the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to remotely identify drones in American skies. The FAA proposal outlines its own approach to identify airborne drones, which is […]

A purposeful large scale three-engined electric crop spraying RPAS that must make more sense than smaller multirotors over huge fields from Pyka. The company’s founding team, Michael Norcia, Chuma Ogunwole, Kyle Moore and Nathan White, come from a variety of well-known companies that work in adjacent spaces: Cora, Kittyhawk, Joby Aviation, Google X, Waymo and […]

Way to make sure nobody comments on a subject, release it on Boxing day, nice move the FAA. Wherever you are in the world, let the FAA politely know what you think as it is very likely that this will become the standard everywhere. This is, in my opinion, is nothing to do with safety. […]

Skyryse, a transportation company, today unveiled the Skyryse Flight Stack, a suite of automation technologies that will help the company make safe urban flight mainstream. The Skyryse Flight Stack comprises technology that automates flight in FAA-approved helicopters, safety and communication systems, and a network of smart helipads to ultimately create a new transportation system in […]

City dwellers’ daily commutes may soon take flight, the rotors of their air taxis spinning as they lift off from the rooftops. In anticipation of this coming era of air travel, called Urban Air Mobility – and many other applications – NASA has developed a flexible way to test new designs for aircraft that use multiple rotors […]

Wing is reshaping the future of delivery. We are an on-demand drone delivery service that can deliver food, medicine or other items within minutes. We’ve also developed an unmanned traffic management platform to safely route drones through the sky. Our service is faster, safer and produces far less pollution than traditional delivery. Originally created in […]

Smart Agriculture Conference (SAC 2020), hosed by XAG, co-organised by Chinese National Precision Agricultural Aviation Centre and partnered with Alipay, was held in Beijing on December 19. The conference featured XAG’s new product launch as well as a Smart Agriculture Report published by global strategy consultancy CLEAR. 400 global audiences, including agricultural experts, government officials, foreign diplomats and […]

If you have been in this industry for a while you might remember in 2009/10/11 sUAS News used to have a count down ticker on the right-hand navigation menu. This was counting down until the FAA was due to sort out regulations for RPAS, the dates came and went and I eventually called it the […]

How the lessons learned from Vahana will inspire the next generation of eVTOLs at Airbus. Nearly four years after the Vahana concept was sketched on a napkin, the flagship programme that launched the urban air mobility initiative at Airbus has come to a close. Vahana’s key learnings are now providing Airbus Urban Mobility with invaluable […]

Labège, France, December 20nd, 2019. Donecle announced today that LATAM Airlines Group, the largest airline in South America, will use its automated drone solution to improve the efficiency and reliability of aircraft visual inspections during base maintenance for their A320 fleet. Donecle provides its drone to LATAM for heavy maintenance checks on its A320 fleet. […]

SkyDrive Inc., a leading flying-car developer, has successfully launched test flights of a cargo drone which could revolutionize the way heavy goods are transported and speed up the movement of equipment in remote locations. The first operational testing took place earlier this month (December) in Toyota City, Japan. It was carried out to test the technology […]

Zero Zero Robotics, the award-winning robotics company pioneering the future of smart flying consumer robotics, announces its newest drone, the world’s first consumer bicopter: V-Coptr Falcon. The V-shaped dual-rotor design marks a significant departure from the universal quad-rotor design consumers are familiar with. With a multi-patented dual rotor propulsion system and proprietary flight control technology, […]

Flirtey announced today it has begun routine drone delivery demonstrations in a designated area inside the Tahoe-Reno Industrial Center (TRI Center), located in Nevada. The demonstrations are in preparation for routine food delivery trials to designated points on the TRI Center park. TRI Center is the largest industrial centre in the United States and is home to more […]

The CAA has published a new AIC providing updated information regarding ADS-B Out for the UK GA fleet. In August 2017 the Civil Aviation Authority confirmed that ADS-B using 1090 MHz is its preferred national system to improve electronic conspicuity for general aviation. Ideally this will be achieved through transponders, although other devices can be integrated and interoperable […]

London, UK: Altitude Angel, the industry-leading UTM (Unmanned Traffic Management) technology provider and general aviation flight planning platform Airmate, have today announced a partnership which will enable general aviation aircraft to see drones, and vice versa, safely and securely. The real-time exchange of aircraft telemetry data between the two organisations will allow the aviation industry […]

The Norwegian Public Roads Administration (Norwegian: Statens vegvesen) is a government agency that oversees the national and regional road network spanning the longest country in Europe. It has earned Norway the title of having the safest roads in the continent from 2015-2017, and the team aims to reach a zero-fatality goal. This goal is to be achieved […]

Dan Dalton has been named the executive vice president of strategic partnerships for the company. In his new role, Dan will be responsible for commercial and government strategy, business partnerships, investor relations and policy partnerships. Dan had served as vice president of operations for Airspace since July 2018. Prior to that, he was head of […]

Drones can deliver packages, help fight fires, and provide other benefits in the United States. Demands on the Federal Aviation Administration’s staff and resources are increasing as FAA works to safely integrate drones into the nation’s airspace. The administration and Congress could choose to set user fees to help FAA recover costs. Planning and considering […]

Zurich, CH (December 17, 2019) – Pierce Manufacturing, an Oshkosh Corporation Company (NYSE:OSK) and Fotokite announced today an exclusive partnership to provide vehicle-integrated aerial situational awareness products to firefighting and public safety teams. The exclusive partnership follows a joint product launch of the Pierce Situational Awareness System by Fotokite at the Fire Department Instructors Conference […]

DroneUp, LLC signed a Participating Addendum with the State of Connecticut established as the Procurement Division Contract #19PSX0049. This begins the offering for the purchase of complete drone solutions to all state agencies, political subdivisions, and institutions in accordance with Conn. Gen. Stat. §4a-54. The award is the first of its kind for the drone […]

Lilium Blog This film shows a complete test flight, performed on 1st October 2019 as part of our first phase of testing with the Lilium Jet. The flight, which lasts approximately three minutes, formed part of our controllability tests and looked specifically at how the aircraft performs during banked turns in transition flight. The aircraft […]

With an upgraded assembly line that allows a faster and more efficient production process, RT can now offer its aerostat systems at 20-25% less than the original price RT LTA Systems Ltd. – a world-class designer, developer and manufacturer of aerostats for use in intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance and communications applications – inaugurates its new headquarters […]

The ability to fly unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) beyond the visual line of sight (BVLOS) significantly improves their effectiveness and potential. The increased range of BVLOS operations requires real-time airspace situational awareness for the UAV pilot and support crew to ensure safe, repeatable operations. Canadian UAVs and Lockheed Martin Canada CDL Systems have signed a […]

Leading AgTech Companies Taranis, Phytobiotics, Continuum Ag, and Rantizo Collaborate on Drone-Based Aerial Application of Micronutrients to Increase Soybean Yield US trial increased soybean yields by 2.6% compared to non-treated adjacent strips and yielded results of 1.51 bushels per acre Sunnyvale, CA – 17 DECEMBER 2019 – Four leading agricultural technology (AgTech) companies announced today the […]

Vertical Technologies has successfully integrated the new Sony A7R mark IV on the DeltaQuad Pro #MAP VTOL UAV. This release marks the first VTOL mapping UAV that supports 61-megapixel mapping. Earlier this year Sony announced the release of their highest resolution camera yet. the Sony Alpha 7R IV offers a full frame 61.0 MP back-illuminated […]

DURANT, Okla. (December 2019) – The Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma (CNO) and Bell Textron Inc., a Textron Inc. (NYSE: TXT) company announced today an agreement to add Bell to the CNO UASIPP team and begin testing some of the Bell innovations and systems on CNO-owned property in rural southeastern Oklahoma. The flights and tests will be […]

Tom Prevot, Director, Airspace Systems Uber Air is our most ambitious vision for the future. It takes Uber’s tech into the skies by making it possible for people to push a button and get an affordable flight. We are working with government and industry stakeholders to create Uber’s first effort into creating an aerial rideshare […]

Researchers at RISE Research Institutes of Sweden have conducted the country´s first aerial food delivery. The flight was autonomous (self driving) and beyond visual line of sight. The drone flew from a restaurant on the outskirts of Linköping city and into Linköping University. It was a relatively short linear distance, but an important milestone in […]

Cognata, Ltd., a leading provider of simulation software for ADAS and autonomous vehicles announced today that Innoviz, a leading provider of high-performance solid-state LiDAR sensors and perception software that bring vision to the automotive and non-automotive industries, has selected Cognata as its simulation partner for testing and validation of its sensor hardware and perception software […]

Leuven, Belgium– December, 2019 – Septentrio, a world leader in high-accuracy GNSS receivers, announced today a collaboration with Analog Devices, Inc. The two companies are combining Analog Devices’ high-quality IMUs with Septentrio’s multi-frequency, multi-constellation GNSS* receivers. The resulting high-performance GNSS/INS systems deliver centimeter-accurate positioning together with 3D orientation (heading, pitch and roll), ideal for applications such as automotive ADAS and industrial automation. *GNSS: Global Navigation […]

Nova Systems has successfully completed the second stage of flight trials for the first UAS Traffic Management (UTM) trials in Singapore. The two-year project is focused on enabling safe and efficient Unmanned Aerial System (UAS) delivery operations and Urban Air Mobility (UAM) within Singapore’s densely populated urban environment. Responding to Singapore’s Ministry of Transport and […]

Ciconia and RelmaTech are working together to deliver a unique onboard Control & Collision Avoidance System (C&CAS) that uses proven Vehicle-to-Vehicle (V2V) radio technologies to enable proximate aircraft to avoid mid-air collisions by being able to ‘see’ and communicate with each other. The companies have entered into an agreement to collaborate in the development and […]

MEMORANDUM FOR THE SECRETARY OF DEFENSE SUBJECT: Presidential Determination Pursuant to Section 303 of the Defense Production Act of 1950, as amended By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, including section 303 of the Defense Production Act of 1950, as amended […]

Congratulations to 16-year-old Korean drone pilot Changhyeon Kang: the new FAI World Drone Racing Champion! The talented young drone ace fought off stiff competition to climb to the top of the podium in Xiangshan Ningbo, China, alongside Australia’s Thomas Bitmatta, 20, in second place and French pilot Killian Rousseau, 15, in third. Kang also scooped […]

On December 14 and 15, the Grandville High School RoboDawgs will play host to top robotics teams from around the Midwest. This 1st annual Midwest Elite VEX tournament will take place at Grandville Middles School and include top teams from Michigan, Indiana, Ohio, and Illinois. Tournament Champions will take home the Old Brass Boots, a pair of antique brass boots introduced as […]

I think that has to be my most clickbaity title of 2019! Three times I have been asked this question this December, and three times I have had the same answer. So I might as well pop it on here so I can send anyone else here! We are talking about something that is to […]

Darmstadt, December 13, 2019 – The German drone start-up Wingcopter has secured a seven-digit financing. The investment comes from Singapore-based Corecam Capital Partners. Wingcopter develops and produces autonomously flying delivery drones for social and civilian applications – true to the company’s guiding principle “Technology with a Purpose”. With its patented tilt-rotor mechanism the startup closes the gap between commercial drones, […]

Wildfire restoration got a huge boost in both safety and speed thanks to a recent FAA approval for Seattle-based DroneSeed. The privately held startup obtained an additional amendment to its already unprecedented FAA Part 333 exemption that enables them to operate their seed-planting drones Beyond Visual Line of Sight (BVLOS) in forested and post-fire areas. This means […]

Pix4D users are doing the coolest things. From Antarctica to Zambia, you’re out there seeing and mapping the world. To be honest, we’re a little bit jealous. That’s why for the final Community Challenge this decade (crazy, right?!) we want to see your best drone or aerial pic. We’re looking for spectacular nadir photos or […]