Walmart-backed drone delivery operator DroneUp is joining forces with Israel-based FlightOps to scale up its operations and fly multiple drones in shared airspace from anywhere on the globe.
Expand Expanding Close
Pioneering drone delivery company Zipline is again striving to break new ground in – and for – autonomous UAV operation by unveiling its new, acoustic-based detect and avoid (DAA) platform allowing craft to identify and evade aerial risks from up to two miles away.
Expand Expanding Close
After over two years of continuous medical drone delivery operations across Africa, Australia’s Swoop Aero has completed a $16 million Series B funding round. But what’s even more impressive is that the logistics startup had the confidence to reject a $100 million takeover offer from a US-based defense company, halfway through the round.
Expand Expanding Close
Draganfly has announced a new delivery drone called Heavy Lift, which can transport packages weighing up to 67 pounds (30kg) to customers within 18 miles (30km). The Canadian drone manufacturer said over two decades of industry experience has gone into making this engineering feat possible. In addition, Draganfly has launched a long-range laser scanning system that can produce survey-grade point cloud data.
Expand Expanding Close
California-based drone logistics company Matternet, which has been working successfully with Swiss Post since 2017, says it will take over drone delivery operations from Switzerland’s national postal service starting January 1, 2023. In addition, Matternet will leverage its experience from operations in Switzerland to build Europe’s first city-wide drone delivery network.
Expand Expanding Close
Toronto-based drone logistics firm Drone Delivery Canada has received Transport Canada’s nod to conduct beyond visual line of sight (BVLOS) drone delivery operations for the University of British Columbia’s Remote Communities Drone Transport Initiative (DTI) program.
Expand Expanding Close
Medical drone delivery operator Spright is teaming up with Latin America aviation company Synerjet in what they believe will be a major step toward expanding access to healthcare services across Brazil.
Expand Expanding Close
We’re working toward a future where passenger air taxis and drone deliveries are to become a part of everyday mobility. But how will these autonomous systems access important information, such as deteriorating weather conditions, to complete each flight safely? To address this issue, NASA researchers are exploring the creation of a decentralized data and reasoning hub that would help autonomous aircraft to make critical safety decisions rapidly.
Expand Expanding Close
Retailing giant Walmart is shifting its aerial partnership with DroneUp into higher gear with its announcement today of expanded drone delivery services to a potential of 4 million households across six US states.
Expand Expanding Close
Talk about beyond visual line of sight. Swoop Aero has won approval from Australia’s Civil Aviation and Safety Authority (CASA) to operate a centralized facility that will allow employees of the drone delivery company to remotely pilot up to five different UAVs over three different continents at once.
Expand Expanding Close
With diabetes patients in Ukraine’s conflict zones cut off from insulin supplies, drones are being roped in to deliver life-saving medication to the people who need it the most.
Expand Expanding Close
Israeli on-demand drone delivery specialist Flytrex has expanded its roster of client businesses in its showcase North Carolina operation by adding orders from sub sandwich maker Jersey Mike’s to the array of items it is flying to consumers’ backyards.
Expand Expanding Close
The official Twitter account of Canada’s Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) asked its 50K+ followers an all-important question this week: “How are illegal guns reaching the hands of criminals in Canada?” But the department already knew part of the answer, thanks to a drone that had seemingly crossed the border from the United States carrying a shopping bag full of Glock semiautomatic pistols.
Expand Expanding Close
Australian logistics and on-demand drone delivery specialist Swoop Aero has struck a partnership with global parcel giant UPS to expand and accelerate its distribution of healthcare supplies in Malawi, and over time elsewhere in the world.
Expand Expanding Close
Urban-Air Port, the London-based developer of vertiports for delivery drones and electronic takeoff and landing (eVTOL) vehicles like air taxis, has opened the doors of its first functional aerial hub – one of 200 terminals it plans to build around the globe in the near future.
Expand Expanding Close
Leading instant logistics specialist Zipline is expanding its geographical area of activity from existing African and US operations with new drone deliveries of medical supplies to Japan’s Gotō Islands.
Expand Expanding Close
Though it took a bit of preparing to get aloft, Alphabet-owned Wing Aviation is set to launch its drone delivery service in the Dallas-Fort Worth (DFW) area this week, a bit over five months after the company announced the expansion of its activities in the fast-growing region.
Expand Expanding Close
Wingcopter says it’s teaming up with German Airways to explore the use of drones in the delivery of spare parts to offshore wind farms. This development comes days after two Singapore-based firms announced their plans to produce offshore wind farm delivery drones that would operate at 90% lower costs than current methods that involve the use of boats or helicopters.
Expand Expanding Close
FedEx says it is joining forces with California-based eVTOL cargo drone manufacturer Elroy Air to explore autonomous solutions within its middle-mile delivery operations. As part of this agreement, FedEx subsidiary FedEx Express will begin testing Elroy Air’s recently announced Chaparral cargo drone in 2023.
Expand Expanding Close
High-flying drone delivery company Flytrex says it will launch fast transport of food orders in suburbs around the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex as part of a geographical expansion of its existing partnership with restaurant group Brinker International.
Expand Expanding Close
Wingcopter, an eVTOL manufacturer and drone delivery service provider based out of Germany, has finally roped in ITOCHU, one of the largest general trading companies (sogo shosha) in Japan, as a strategic investor and authorized partner. Wingcopter first hinted at this partnership in December 2021, when it announced an investment from Drone Fund, a Japan-based venture capital firm dedicated exclusively to the drone technology ecosystem.
Expand Expanding Close
Amazon’s drone delivery program is again under the scanner with a new Business Insider report highlighting how an experimental Prime Air drone set several acres of a wheat farm ablaze when it crashed in eastern Oregon during a test flight last summer.
Expand Expanding Close
Draganfly says it is readying critical lifesaving drones for deployment with Revived Soldiers Ukraine (RSU), a non-profit organization focusing on medical response and rehabilitation of injured troops in Ukraine. While 10 medical drone delivery platforms and search and rescue drones will be dispatched by the Canada-based UAV manufacturer immediately, the initial order size can go up to 200 units, the company says. In addition, Draganfly will be donating three drone systems to RSU.
Expand Expanding Close
Drone delivery partners Skyports and Swoop Aero are extending their joint operations through an additional linkup with German pharmaceutical logistics specialist BD Rowa, with aims of integrating autonomous air transport in the supply chain of medication and healthcare supplies.
Expand Expanding Close