Integrated drone services company Volatus says it is teaming up with uncrewed aerial systems (UAS) producer Avidrone Aerospace to offer clients autonomous cargo drone delivery services in markets around the world.
Under the deal, Volatus will assume worldwide distribution rights for Avidrone aircraft, including those in the stable of UAVs the company offers to clients as part of its full range of UAS services. Initially, Volatus will angle its work with Avidrone craft toward clients with cargo drone delivery needs, particularly businesses with relatively larger payloads to haul. That plays into Avidrone’s innovative freight vehicles, which can transport goods ranging from 5 lbs. to 50 lbs. over distances of up to 100 miles.
At first glance, the pairing seems a quicker fit for industrial, construction, military, or government customers with specific drone cargo operation needs. Those focused missions often involve quicker authorization and other flight clearance procedures with civil aviation authorities than open-ended commercial deliveries of packages or food offered by companies like Wing and Zipline. While neither partner is foreswearing developing that latter activity as it grows to what some estimates expect to be a $4.40 billion global market by 2025, they’ll initially give priority to enterprise drone demand where it’s strongest and in need of integrated solutions.
“Through our partnership with Avidrone, we are excited to be able to offer fully automated and commercialized cargo delivery solutions allowing us to provide equipment, solutions, and operator services to meet the needs of both civil and defense clients,” says Glen Lynch, chief executive officer of Volatus. “While continuing to monitor expected regulatory changes and technology developments for last-mile deliveries in urban areas, our main focus is serving more immediate demands for cargo delivery opportunities to remote communities, heavy industrial sites, medical resupply, and offshore logistics.”
Canada’s Volatus offers services spanning aerial inspections, mapping, survey, and imaging, to training, consultancy, and instruction in obtaining certification for a variety of drone flight modes – from basic piloting to beyond visual line of sight operation. In addition to selling a wide selection of craft and sensors for use by customers, the company also provides UAV servicing; data processing and management; systems design engineering; and research, development, manufacturing, testing and commercialization work for emerging technologies.
Now added to those will be the marketing, flight instruction, and mission optimization of Avidrone’s elongated, dual-rotor cargo drones that deliver critical supplies like medicine, tools, and parts to remote or difficult to access destinations.
“Our heavy-lift, fully-automated drone technologies have been developed specifically to target automated cargo delivery applications and are already in service with defense and industrial users globally,” says Scott Gray, founder and CEO of Avidrone Aerospace. “Volatus well understands this rapidly growing market and has demonstrated the motivation, operational capabilities, and resources needed to connect vast customer applications to the systems we provide now and open opportunities for our future platforms with even greater payload, range and capabilities.”
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