Swoop Aero has just closed its Series A funding round with investors Right Click Capital and Tempus Partners returning after a year of global growth. The company will use its newly found capital to boosts its efforts and reach its goal of helping 100 million people have access to better healthcare by 2025 using its delivery drones.
ANRA Technologies and partners, Swiggy, the Indian Institute of Technology, Ropar, and BetterDrones have been approved to begin beyond visual line of sight (BVLOS) drone deliveries in India after the Indian Ministry of Civil Aviation (MoCA) granted exemptions to the company.
Quaternium Technologies has released a video showing off a potential use for its long-endurance drone by delivering a spare tire in a fraction of the time standard roadside assistance is able to get to you. The drone was able to deliver the spare tire within minutes of the text being sent.
Google’s Wing Aviation will soon be delivering library books to kids in Virginia using its delivery drones, thanks to middle-school librarian Kelly Passek. Ms. Passek was stunned at the speed her goods were delivered by Wing’s drones, resulting in her asking if books could be delivered.
Researchers from Stanford University are working on new ways drones can transport goods in urban areas, using current transport networks such as buses. This possibility for drone deliveries could see them happening even faster while addressing one of the biggest issues delivery drones are facing.
Quantum-Systems took to the sky in Munich with its medical delivery drone to test transporting vials of blood. The test drone was able to complete the delivery in just under seven minutes.
On National Donut Day, LaMar’s Donuts held its first-ever Essential Service Awards, with the winners receiving free donuts delivered by drone as a thank you. The winners were nominated by fellow citizens in the five states LaMar’s Donuts operates out of.
Remote islands off the coast of South Korea will soon see drone deliveries, thanks to Pablo Air. Pablo Air hopes to use drones to provide the islands with high-efficiency deliveries that can replace the expensive ships currently used to carry passengers and cargo.
A drone recently delivered a package of parts to the Allseas’ Pioneering Spirit construction vessel, the world’s largest vessel by gross tonnage, making it the first drone delivery of its kind. The pilot project is looking at the usefulness of drones to increase the transport efficiency at the Port of Rotterdam.
Today we have a lot of deliveries by vans in the US and a small but growing smattering of deliveries by drones, such as new trials by Wing, Zipline, and Flirty. Researchers at MIT have proposed
marrying the two technologies: deploying vans to neighborhoods that would launch drones to make the last part of the delivery.
Zipline‘s medical delivery drones have made their first US delivery late last week in North Carolina—six months ahead of schedule. The first drone delivery was pushed forward in response to COVID-19, delivering protective masks.
It can take six hours to get from a hospital in Oban, Scotland, to one on the nearby Isle of Mull, just 10 miles away. But a drone delivery can cover the distance in only 15 minutes, allowing it to bring urgently needed medical supplies on demand.
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Wing, owned by Google parent company Alphabet, is doing a brisk drone delivery business around the world. The company operates in Australia, Finland, and Virginia in the US, and has seen its deliveries double month after month globally.
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Rotterdam in the Netherlands has the busiest port in Europe. And now it’s getting just a tad busier with the arrival of drone deliveries.
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COVID-19 is pushing society to get creative with how we do business and use technology. That’s included calls to expand drone use for contact-free deliveries. Now two senators are calling on the FAA to waive rules that slow down development of drone delivery services.
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Delivery drones may be having their springtime, thanks to the pressure of the coronavirus. The need for contact-free delivery and the urgency of innovation are helping to push this nascent business forward. Now drone delivery company Flirtey has obtained a key patent for tech that makes deliveries safe.
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Everdrone has announced today that it will begin to use autonomous drones in Sweden to deliver automated external defibrillators (AEDs) to the scenes of cardiac arrests. The drones will serve over 80,000 residents in the city of Gothenburg. They can be in the air within minutes and have a flight radius of 6 km (about 3.7 miles).
The bars may be closed, but the skies are open over the town of Rathdrinagh in Ireland. That’s where McKeever’s Bar & Lounge has turned to new technology to serve its customers: drone beer deliveries.
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Last month we brought you news of a proposed drone program to deliver medical supplies to the Isle of Wight in the UK. On May 9, the first successful test flight of the Windracers Ultra drone occurred.
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The UK is slowly moving forward with drone services to address the COVID-19 crisis. With a medical delivery program set to start in the English Channel, news now comes of a drone delivery trial way up north in Scotland.
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Another week, another COVID-19 inspired drone delivery service seems to launch. A startup called Dive Delivery has just announced a backyard drone delivery program for two Bay Area counties: San Mateo to the south of San Francisco, and Contra Costa to the east.
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To see the future of drones, just visit Africa today. That’s especially true in Rwanda, which is likely the most drone-friendly country in the world. So it was a fitting place to host the African Drone Forum and its public service drone competition earlier this year, before COVID-19 made such gatherings impossible. The winners were just announced this week.
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Since 2016, Rwanda has been leading the world in using drones to serve its people. Now that work continues with a new program delivering chemotherapy meds in the era of COVID-19 social distancing.
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