With strict rules on drone operation now gradually relaxing in India, European UAV manufacturer Fixar has announced plans to begin marketing its craft in the giant south Asian market with local partner Paras Aerospace, focusing first on its flagship fixed-wing Fixar007.
Producer of autonomous vertical takeoff and landing drones, Fixar will be handing over administrative, legal, distribution, and technical support duties of its India activity to Paras Aerospace, which will also oversee craft certification. Once that’s obtained, the partners will roll out the Fixar007, a UAV designed for enterprise applications that include mapping, inspection, aerial imaging, precision agriculture, surveillance, and monitoring.
In a second phase, the pair will launch Indian sales of the Fixar Indoor, a small, lightweight UAV designed for mapping, inspection, monitoring, surveillance, inventory, and exploration in confined spaces. In making the announcement, Fixar said it expected administrative requirements to be completed in time for the venture to make its drones available to users in India sometime in November.
Surging drone activity in India has driven use and increased current estimated market value to $1 billion, Fixar says. That spike was due in part to exceptional efforts and creative ways in transporting medical supplies and vaccines to remote locations amid the Covid pandemic.
But it has also been lifted by a governmental decision in July to walk away from the tangle complex, multi-layered, and generally impenetrable regulations applied to drone operation only five months earlier. Though still relatively binding, the replacement rules adopted this summer have given a growing number of businesses across the country the freedom and confidence to take to their activities skies.
Fixar has clearly identified considerable opportunity in that bustle, and is now moving to make its drones available to potential users in India.
“We’re excited to enter the Indian market as it holds great potential,” says Vasily Lukashov Fixar’s founder and CEO. “We estimate fast overall UAV market expansion based on a liberalization of drone rules in India, which eases user and operator access to unmanned aerial vehicles and allows to apply UAV solutions to a broader array of applications. We are glad to take this step together with Paras as a well-known and reliable company in the field of aerospace in India.”
The partners wager the Fixar007 will fit into that action well. The craft can be set up in less than five minutes, and provides maximum mission distance of 37.3 miles with 4.4 lbs. payload that Fixar claims tops rivals in the same drone class.
Officials at Paras Aerospace, an affiliate of Paras Defense, believe Fixar drones are ideally suited for expanding enterprise demand in India.
“Drones play an essential part in the successful implementation of various key functions imperative for operational excellence, whether it is real-time video surveillance, cargo delivery, laser scanning or aerial photography,” Paras Aerospace CEO Pankaj Akula said of the nation’s growing UAV activity. “Fixar is the platform with Fixed Angular Rotor Drone concept which will uniquely address this requirement.”
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