sUAS News

On Wednesday, RAND Corporation released a research report on delivery drones titled ‘What’s the Buzz? The City-Scale Impacts of Drone Delivery’. The report specifically deals with city package deliveries using drones, using mathematical models to assess the impact on energy consumption, infrastructure requirements, aerial congestion, privacy, and noise. The report does not go into the […]

This week, DJI announced availability of the last model in their Phantom 3 range, the DJI Phantom 3 SE, retailing for $599 in the United States. According to DJI: “The Phantom 3 SE features several improvements over its predecessor, the Phantom 3 Standard, including the ability to record 4K ultra high-definition video, and a Vision […]

Virginia Tech is a public land-grant university, committed to teaching and learning, research, and outreach to the Commonwealth of Virginia, the nation, and the world. Building on its motto of Ut Prosim (that I may serve), Virginia Tech is dedicated to InclusiveVT—serving in the spirit of community, diversity, and excellence. We seek candidates who adopt […]

by Shane Carmody, Chief Executive Officer and Director of Aviation Safety – CASA Overview Australia was one of the first countries in the world to introduce legislation governing the operation of remotely piloted aircraft (RPA), commonly referred to as drones. Part 101 of the Civil Aviation Safety Regulations 1998 (CASR) was introduced in 2002 in […]

Leading commercial drone manufacturer MMC is a recognized innovator in drone tech – and now they’re changing the way the drone industry does business. MMC are partnering with helicopter service centers and other providers across the globe as they expand their game-changing One Stop Drone Rental centers. Now in Asia, India, and Germany MMC plans […]

FreeWave Technologies, Inc., a leader in industrial, secure Machine-to-Machine (M2M) and Internet of Things (IoT) wireless networking solutions, announces general availability of its MM2-5 Watt 1.3 GHz (13X5W) integrated radio (http://www.freewave.com/mm2-m13-series/). The MM2-13X5W features an external 5 Watt output, making the radio ideal for unmanned aerial systems (UAS), original equipment manufacturers (OEM) and military applications […]

Pix4D’s rayCloud is an iconic interface which connects 2D original images to the 3D reconstructed point cloud. In rayCloud, you can easily add and edit your GCPs/MTPs to improve your project accuracy, without having to go image by image for searching where the points locate. You can simply click on an approximate location in the […]

Dronomy, a software company focused on building knowledge into construction, today announced it has integrated with PlanGrid, the leader in construction productivity software. Together, general contractors, project owners, real estate developers and subcontractors can now add current, objective, and contextual views of their project status into their construction management workflow. “Dronomy and PlanGrid are innovators […]

Lensrentals, the largest online provider of photography and video equipment for rental throughout the US, today announced a trial of drone and virtual reality (VR) equipment for rental nationwide. From today the Mavic DJI Pro, DJI Phantom 4 Pro and DJI Inspire 2 drones, and a number of supporting equipment items can be found under […]

by David Harrison – Safety Director, NATS The Government recently published its response to the consultation it ran on the safe use of drones in the UK. The headline announcement is the plan to introduce mandatory registration for drones over 250 grams in weight, as well as mandatory competency testing to support it. While there are […]

Insitu, a leading information services company with more than one million operational unmanned aircraft systems flight hours, today announced its partnership with FireWhat, and Esri, the world leader in spatial analytics. Through this partnership, aerial reconnaissance for fighting wildfires will be provided by Insitu’s INEXA Solutions, comprised of INEXA Control, Insitu air vehicles including the […]

Landing in my inbox in time for today’s daily email, Yuneec owners and operators also seem to be seeking clarity on data protection policies. Last month, rumours were mounting that no single overseas manufacturer would be targeted. It would be an equal opportunity clamp down. I believe this story might be categorised as developing. I have heard […]

DJI has appointed Roger Luo, previously the Vice President of Operations, as President of the company, effective immediately. Mr. Luo’s role will focus on developing DJI’s business internationally in markets that have seen a significant increase in demand for innovative drone and camera applications. “DJI now has over 11,000 staff worldwide, with offices in 17 […]

Today, Sentera announced the availability of its Double 4K precision agriculture sensor on DJI Phantom 4 Professional, Advanced, and Standard drones. This offering provides Double 4K quality at entry-level pricing, expanding late-season data collection options for agronomists, crop consultants, and growers. Several system configurations are available including collection of normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI), normalized […]

Czech company Primoco UAV SE, which develops, manufactures and sells the unmanned aircraft, Primoco UAV One 100/150, extends its portfolio with the new self-designed Primoco 500 piston engine. The engine is designed not only for its unmanned aircraft, but also for other aircraft manufacturers. The Primoco 500 is an air-cooled four-cylinder engine with a power […]

By Joshua Ziering | Chief Pilot, Kittyhawk.io On August 21st 2017, we will experience a total eclipse for the first time in 38 years.(The last cosmic event of this magnitude happened on February 26, 1979) We expect a very large number of drones taking to the skies during this historical event so we compiled a […]

Yuneec, the world leader in electric aviation, today announced its all-new Yuneec Extended Service (YES!) plan, offering unlimited manufacturer defect repairs. Yuneec Extended Service plans were created to serve a range of service needs. From free shipping, to non-warranty repairs, YES! plans ensure that you keep flying worry free. YES! Is available as a one […]

UAV service provider Aerodyne today passed three major milestones during an ongoing inspection for a major South East Asia Power Provider. Aerodyne teams celebrated their achievement of passing 30,000 assets inspected, analyzed and presented through their award-winning Vertikaliti cloud-based solution. In the same week they also broke through both 11,000km of infrastructure completed and 11,000 […]

Today, AirMap and Kansas Department of Transportation (KDOT) are announcing that they will deploy Unmanned Traffic Management (UTM) technology across the state of Kansas. The initiative, which is the first of its kind in the United States, will support the growth of the state’s drone economy and ensure safer skies for all who live, work, […]

VStar Systems, a privately held aerospace and defense systems company, has announced the addition of remote operations to its MA-C SIGINT Sensor, foregoing the need for operators to be co-located with the aircraft ground station. This new capability provides even more flexibility, greater utility and extremely useful intelligence. “With most sensors on smaller unmanned aerial […]

by Jay Levine, X-Press Editor | NASA Armstrong Flight Research Center NASA’s Unmanned Aircraft Systems Integration in the National Airspace System, or UAS in the NAS, project is attracting international attention as increasingly complex flight tests take place over NASA’s Armstrong Flight Research Center in California. Two events at Armstrong June 29 and July 13 […]

DR1 Racing, an international drone racing organization, today announced the title sponsors and locations for the upcoming 2017 season airing on Eurosport and Fox Sports internationally. DHL has committed itself to become a founding partner in DR1 and the title sponsor of the Champions Series. In addition to DHL, Mountain Dew is returning for a […]

Createk Design Lab, based at the Sherbrooke University in Quebec, Canada has designed the Multimodal Autonomous Drone, or S-MAD for short. S-MAD’s approach to, and landing on a wall, was designed to mimic the way small birds achieve perching. Createk Design Lab recently posted a Youtube video showing their system in action and according to […]

Centrik for UAS continues to grow at home and overseas. We are now looking to grow the team again with a specialist UAS Business Development Manager who can build on this success. Role Overview The UAS Business Development Manager is to deliver sales success globally in meeting agreed targets and in owning the entire sales […]

A new commercial-grade VTOL fixed-wing UAV was specifically designed to meet the inspection needs of electric and gas utilities. Here is a video of last week’s demo flight: The new UAV was custom developed by ULC Robotics’ UAV and engineering teams and has a flight time of up to 5 hours and a 10-pound payload […]

SOFWERX has invited USSOCOM Special Operations Warfighters, Interagency Partners, and select contributors from Industry and Academia to participate in a Rapid Prototyping Event (RPE) called “ThunderDrone”. ThunderDrone is a focused technology innovation effort related to drones (sea, land, air, and space), tactical swarms, payloads (kinetic/non-kinetic), and their associated data science applications for the Special Operations […]

The first drone flight controlled via a dedicated ‘network slice’ on a pre-5G mobile network has been demonstrated by UK company uVue. The drone was operated over BT’s pre-5G network slicing testbed, using LTE radio access during the company’s biennial Innovation Week at the BT Labs, Martlesham, near Ipswich, UK. uVue and BT executed well […]

Rock in Rio is a world-class music festival. A star-studded lineup of acts and record-breaking attendance are the ingredients that go into its success. The promoters also go all out every year to deliver a mind-blowing audiovisual production. So, in keeping with their proud tradition, the 2017 Rock in Rio will be the first edition to wow […]

Congratulations to SkySkopes, and Sharper Shape Inc. they have undertaken the first sock pull mission with a drone in North America. No, I didn’t know what a sock pull was either. The sock line is a smaller lead line or sleeve that is then used to guide much heavier power lines across the gap between poles. This is […]

QUT will deploy drones in a high-tech effort to find and protect koalas in South East Queensland, with the State Government today announcing a funding boost for koala conservation. The two-year project to be led by Dr Grant Hamilton, from QUT’s Science and Engineering Faculty, will use drones and high resolution imagery to allow for rapid estimates of […]

Former Attorney General of Louisiana, Charles C. Foti, Jr., Esq., a partner at the law firm of Kahn Swick & Foti, LLC (“KSF”), announces that KSF has commenced an investigation into GoPro, Inc. (NasdaqGS: GPRO). On September 19, 2016, after months of buildup and delay, GoPro announced the release of its “Karma” drone unit touting its quality and capability […]

Ask those in the tech sector about the latest hot devices and drones sit at the top of the “emerging product” category. It’s hard to miss all these devices zooming above the treetops these days but drones come in all shapes and sizes and don’t just cruise in the air. A sizzling part of this […]

Saxon Remote Systems a Kansas based company was awarded a contract in Jan. to design, build and integrate a 48 megapixel multispectral camera array for Visual Intelligence. This sensor will revolutionize the UAS Industry The Hummingbird Elite will do the following: The Hummingbird Elite will integrate with nearly any multi rotor system capable of carrying a […]

By David Walters | ConsortiQ Ltd Are you adhering to your clients Data Security and privacy requirements, as well as your own? So it’s a story that’s been bubbling away for a while now and it’s finally out. The US Army has issued a Memorandum enforcing the discontinued use of DJI Products due to cyber security concerns. […]

Today, we are pleased to announce the results of a six-month long research project conducted by Altitude Angel and Imperial College London, supported by Microsoft. How to successfully integrate manned and unmanned aviation into our skies safely is widely considered to be one of the factors limiting the transformative potential of civilian drone technology, and […]

What is the humanitarian drone test corridor? The new Humanitarian Drone Testing Corridor in Malawi is an exciting innovation that UNICEF has pioneered in partnership with the Government of Malawi. In December 2016, the Government of Malawi and UNICEF announced an agreement to create a testing corridor for humanitarian use of drones. In June 2017, […]

According to a U.S. Army memo obtained by sUAS News, the U.S. Army Research Lab and U.S. Navy have concluded that there are operational risks associated with DJI equipment, a move that was run up the flag pole last month but kept under wraps. Speaking to sUAS News via e-mail, DJI’s Public Relations Manager, Michael […]

Teledyne DALSA, a Teledyne Technologies company and global leader in image sensing technology, congratulates the University of Toronto Aerospace Team’s (UTAT) UAV and Aerial Robotics Divisions on their recent success at Unmanned Systems Canada’s national competition. Both teams were honored with awards for the design and performance of their custom-built unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) which […]

Measure, a U.S. provider of drone solutions for enterprise customers, today announced the expansion of its drone engineering and equipment sales capabilities with the acquisition of Pilatus Unmanned. Josh Kornoff, Pilatus Unmanned CEO and a pioneer in the commercial drone industry, will head Measure’s engineering team. The acquisition marks the latest chapter in Measure’s rapid […]

(Cape Town, South Africa) Aerial data-analytics specialist Aerobotics has secured a joint R8 million (8 million South African Rands) seed-funding round from 4Di, an independent early-stage technology venture-capital firm in Cape Town, and the Savannah Fund in Kenya. Aerobotics has developed data-analytics platform Aeroview, which uses satellites, drones and artificial intelligence to help farmers optimise […]

Drones have been flying over construction sites for years, but have often been regarded as toys or seen as useful for only specific scenarios with high-technology needs, or perhaps to market sites with video or photos. Pilot programs continue to spring up, and technology is being introduced internally at a small scale in many companies, […]

The ArduPilot project is pleased to announce the creation of a new initiative, “Open Solo”. This work is made possible by 3DR’s recent release of the SoloLink codebase to the Open Source community, and by the ever-ongoing work by the ArduPilot and Solo communities behind the scenes. 3DR’s press release is here: https://3dr.com/blog/announcing-opensolo The benefits […]

SkyLogic Research just released a new research report titled “Five Valuable Business Lessons Learned About Drones in Public Safety and First Responder Operations.” This is the fifth and final in a series of white papers intended to share lessons learned in specific industries and how to maximize the value drones can deliver in those industries. […]

Sheon Karol, a Managing Director of The DAK Group, has been selected by the UCC, in consultation with the Debtor (Lily Robotics, Inc.), as Trustee of the Drone LC Creditors’ Liquidating Trust. The Bankruptcy Court yesterday granted the motion of Lily Robotics, Inc. (the Debtor) for preliminary approval of the Disclosure Statement regarding its Plan […]

Farmers Insurance® today announced that it has enlisted a fleet of unmanned aerial aircraft systems (UAS) to enhance the claims experience for customers who have suffered significant damage to their roof following major weather events. After field tests to assess the most effective and customer-centric ways of leveraging drone technology with its existing claims operation, […]

Governor Andrew M. Cuomo last week announced that Gryphon Sensors, a SRC Inc. company based in Central New York, has developed a state-of-the-art mobile Unmanned Traffic Management system called Mobile Skylight. The development builds on the state’s investments in the region’s emerging Unmanned Aerial Systems industry. Last August, the Governor announced a $5 million commitment […]

JARUS is pleased to announce to the RPAS Community that the deliverable “JAR doc 06 on Specific Operations Risk Assessment (SORA)” is now available on the JARUS Website at http://jarus-rpas.org/publications. This document recommends a risk assessment methodology to establish a sufficient level of confidence that a specific operation can be conducted safely. Next to the […]

We’re looking for a sales engineer with a min of three years of sales experience. Must be very well spoken, technically minded with a passion to get things done in a fast moving, dynamic and competitive unmanned aviation industry. Salary negotiable depending on experience. Aviation or drone experience a plus. Please send CV and short […]

Recently there have been media reports of unauthorized flight control parameter modifications that enable DJI drones to circumvent built-in safety features, including geofencing restrictions. A recent firmware update issued for all DJI drones fixes reported issues and ensures DJI’s products continue to provide information and features supporting safe flight. DJI will continue to investigate additional […]

Insitu reached a milestone worth celebrating when the company’s unmanned platforms — ScanEagle, Integrator and RQ-21A Blackjack — hit a collective one million operational flight hours last week. This event represents the latest achievement in the company’s 23 years of professional aviation history. “Insitu’s path to one million operational flight hours has been navigated by […]