We just released the results of our third annual drone industry benchmark survey and it’s a kicker.

The 2018 Drone Market Sector Report examines worldwide drone sales, service providers, business and public agency users, and software services. This independent research, which is sponsored by DJI, DroneDeploy, DroneInsurance.com, and Trimble, finds a growing demand for businesses to use drone-acquired data in their day-to-day operations as well as other fresh insights on major drone industry segments.

Research

Our online market survey garnered over 2,500 respondents representing over 60 industries worldwide. Our analysis yields 10 key insights that summarize the current state of the industry, plus detailed analysis of drone adoption by businesses and enterprises.

Report

The 107-page report presents the results and analyses from each survey question. It’s organized to match our survey, with four sections that correspond to the four major segments of the drone industry:

1. Drone aircraft and payloads purchased
2. Service providers that offer drone-based imaging or sensing services for outside hire or sale
3. Businesses and public agencies with drone programs
4. Software apps or online services for drone operations and imaging

The report features more than 60 helpful figures and tables and offering insight and analysis on:

• Who’s buying what types of drones from which makers at what prices and for what uses.
• How large the drone-based service providers are, and how they position themselves to their target industries.
• Who the business users of drone-based projects are, and which industries have traction.
• How much service providers, business users, and public agencies are using flight management, mission planning, and image processing software for drone-based projects.

Findings

Among the more interesting findings are that commercial drone fleet sizes are smaller than most people think. If you believe the hyperbole, there are hundreds of thousands of drones in the airspace at the same time, but the survey finds that the average commercial user has just two drones that are only flying two projects a month and most of those flights consume less than flight three hours.

There are many other insights in the report, but these three are especially worth highlighting:

• Professional use of drones is growing. We find that almost three-quarters of all drones weighing over 250 grams are purchased for professional purposes—either governmental or business. This is up from last year.
• DJI continues to dominate the market and has made gains this year in every category from drone aircraft at all price ranges, to add-on payloads, to software. Survey data shows DJI is still the dominant brand for drone aircraft purchases, with a 74% global market share in sales across all price points.
• Most businesses and public agencies are new to drones, have small programs, and perform their own services. The survey finds that nearly three-quarters of businesses or public agencies have only had a drone program in place for two or fewer years.

How to get it

You can download a complete prospectus or purchase the report here: http://droneanalyst.com/research/research-studies/2018-drone-market-sector-report-purchase

Image credit: Skylogic Research

We just announced the launch of our third annual Drone Market Sector Research survey, which promises to be its most comprehensive study of drone market trends and usage to date. The online portion of this research seeks to get information about who is buying and using small unmanned aircraft systems—otherwise known as drones. It improves upon the 2017 research by, among other things:

• Asking more specific questions about flight operations and flight times
• Investigating the adoption and maturity of enterprise and/or public agency drone programs
• Diving into how users geo-reference images for maps

Take the brief 10-minute survey here: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/2018_drone_market

As an incentive for participation in the survey, there will be an opportunity to:

• Receive a free summary report of the research results, a $95 value
• Enter to win a free DJI Spark mini drone package (a $425 value) or one of two $100 VISA gift cards.

What’s new?

This year’s research is designed to uncover fresh insights on which drone industry sectors are thriving (and which aren’t) and how businesses are using drone-acquired data in their day-to-day operations. Skylogic Research hopes the survey results will fill a gap in knowledge and understanding of the commercial drone industry around:

• Actual drone and drone data usage (most reports forecast use but don’t survey actual users)
• How and why operators and users are deploying drones now and how/why they plan to grow their use in the future
• Baseline statistics for market share among the brands as well as information about the size of service providers, enterprises, and businesses that have drone programs

The online portion of this year’s research seeks to get information about who is buying and using small unmanned aircraft systems. This independent study is being supported by DJI, DroneDeploy, DroneInsurance.com, and Trimble.

The survey will explore:

• Who’s buying what types of drones from which makers at which prices and for what uses?
• How large are drone-based service providers, and how and where are they positioning themselves to whom and which target industries?
• What most concerns businesses that perform drone-based projects and why?
• How much are service providers, business buyers, and public agencies using flight management and data analytic software for image-based projects?

Our previous studies have found that more consumer drones are being used for professional use than ever before, the U.S. market is flooded with service providers and remote pilots but very few make enough money to sustain a full-time venture, and film / photo / video dominates both the hobby and professional uses of drones. This year’s study will continue to challenge these insights and explore further the sustainability of drone service providers.

Who should take the survey?

• Individuals or organizations who have purchased a drone in the past 12 months for any reason
• Commercial drone service providers
• Businesses, enterprises, and public agencies that perform drone-based operations

Why this study?

We believe the consumer and commercial drone market needs this annual benchmark study. There is a lack of objective information on the drone industry. We find an absence of credible market-based research and little understanding of the difference between large industry forecasts and actual buyer adoption rates. This study will clarify much of that.

When complete, the research study will provide a complete view of topics like:

• Critical industry drivers
• Vendor and service provider market share
• Business and public agency adoption trends and issues

The survey will be open for four weeks, and the results will be available in September.

Image: Shutterstock and Skylogic Research

We just released the Quick Start Guide to Drones in Construction. This report is the first in a new series of free white papers, intended to provide a complete primer to drone use in specific industries. This year, we are building on the analysis we did for the 2017 Five Valuable Business Lessons Learned papers by providing guidance and industry-specific resources that will help you kick-start your practice. Our goal is to help drone-based service providers and business users maximize the value that drones can bring to operational groups.

This report consolidates our best insights into the challenges and solutions drones add to the worksite. We show how drones as a unified data collection device are bridging the gap between the Architectural, Engineering, and Construction (AEC) silos. We answer questions like:

• How big is the construction drone market, and who are the major solution providers?
• How are drones used in the AEC industry, and what are the challenges?
• What do you need to know about regulations, pilot certification, insurance, and training?
• What are the best practices for adopting drones into workflows?

Here is an excerpt from the lessons learned / cautionary tales section:

“Be clear about customer value – When drone business service providers talk publicly about the differentiation of drones, you’ll often hear them say: “It’s all about the data.” But one of the lessons learned from the early adopters of drones in construction is that it isn’t just about the data. It’s about getting good information that provides value for the construction or architectural firm. So whether teams are collaborating around one daily map for a construction site as “the single source of truth,” or providing floor-by-floor visualization views for a future building site, the ultimate goal is to provide valuable information for downstream customers—and drones alone cannot do that. What drones can do is offer a much quicker way of capturing different types of data, digitizing it, and making it something you can analyze immediately or over time to support construction variance analysis.”

The 10-page report also provides a SWOT analysis (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats) for evaluating and designing your drone program and comes with an appendix that includes links to valuable online resources such as attorneys, advocacy groups, training & certification, and waivers & authorizations.

I believe this is the perfect time to get your start using drones in the construction industry like hundreds of firms worldwide have done. You can get the free report here.

If you have questions about something in the report or would like to comment on it after reading it, please write a comment below or write me directly at colin@droneanalyst.com.

Last year at this time, I reflected back on the news and trends of the commercial drone markets of 2016 and wrote about the mixed state of affairs ahead for 2017. Throughout the year, I offered my perspective on how the drone industry was still motivated by hype and how assessing forward momentum required hard data on the performance of the various sectors of the industry. To that end, we did research over the summer that surveyed 2,600 respondents on drone purchases, service providers, business users, and software services. In September, we published the data in 2017 Drone Market Sector Report 2017.

In this post, I’ll use that data to illustrate the major trends of the past year and describe what I think are the major challenges ahead for the drone industry.

Listen to this companion Drone Radio Show podcast here for the complete assessment.

Trend 1—Growth

By all measures, the drone industry in 2017 was marked by significant growth – growth in aircraft sales, software licenses, the number of service businesses entering the market, and the number of industrial businesses setting up commercial operations.

Here are a few statistics:

• We project U.S. sales in 2017 to be about 3.3M units, which is 36% above 2016 figures. That’s all drones, all sizes. It’s about 1.3M units for the >250gram category.
• As of October 31st, there were about 837,000 hobbyist users and 107,000 non-hobbyist drones registered with the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).
• As of December 1^st, there were about 66,000 Part 107 FAA Pilots.

This represents a big change in the commercial market since Part 107 regulations supplanted Section 333 as the means for commercial operations in the U.S. What this and our survey data tells us is the number of service providers currently outpaces demand, and as a result, service prices are coming down significantly.

Trend 2—Consumerization

We said in our report that more consumer drones are being used for commercial work than ever before. For example, our data shows that more than two-thirds (68%) of all drones weighing over 250 grams are purchased for professional purposes—either governmental or business.

Why is this significant? Because the impact of consumer-originated technology on the enterprise is something that can’t be ignored. Enterprises want to take advantage of powerful, yet easy-to-use products (like DJI’s popular consumer models), and put them to work on the job. What this means for operators or businesses is that a shared core technology benefits all users and enables companies to scale the best experiences to everyone. Enterprise customers get the added simplicity and usability of the consumer product that has been built to meet the demands of thousands of customers around the world.  The average individual pilot gets to benefit from the reliability and scalability inherent in the product and demanded by enterprise users.

Trend 3—The DJI effect

Our data shows DJI is the clear market leader in drone aircraft sales and almost every software category. For example, DJI is the dominant brand for drone aircraft purchases, with a 72% global market share across all price points and an even higher share (87%) of the core $1,000–$1,999 price segment. Additionally, in the three categories of software we evaluated, DJI is the market-share leader in two: flight logging and operations, and automated mission planning.

This is significant because by building on top of its existing technology platform, DJI has fast-tracked development and has benefited from economies of scale. By migrating a successful technology stack and feature set up market, DJI never has to reinvent the wheel—it just needs to improve upon the original design and save engineering cycles for real innovation.

The upshot is that, to stay relevant, all the other major vendors have had to partner with DJI (see Trend 5 Partnerships, below). DJI’s sales success has taken market share from others and has led to layoffs at 3DR, Autel, GoPro, Parrot, and Yuneec. However, fears about data security remain. And this has some speculating about whether DJI can sustain its leadership role in the future.

Trend 4—Investments

According to CB Insights, investments shifted in 2017 from aircraft hardware to software. In 2016, there were 106 deals totaling $542M. Most of these were for hardware. In 2017, VCs focused on software, end-to-end solutions, and counter-drone technology. CB Insights projects the year will end with 110 deals totaling $494M. The most significant investment this past year was 3D Robotics’ $53M Series D round. It saw them pivot from hardware to software services.

Why is this significant?  Because it shows the industry is still maturing. Seed and Series A rounds represented 60% of all deals in 2017; whereas early-stage share peaked in 2015 at 73% of deals. Additionally some of the most well-funded drone companies are targeting enterprise and industrial inspection.

What this means for operators or businesses is greater affordability. Software advances, computer chip manufacturing techniques, and economies of scale will continue to drive down the cost of drone platforms and sensors and solutions.

Trend 5—Partnerships

This year we saw a change from synergistic merger and acquisitions to the creation of end-to-end solutions via partnerships. For example, look at how DJI’s enterprise partnerships have grown. Consider their AirWorks conference. What drone major vendor wasn’t there? The list included DroneDeploy, Measure, PrecisionHawk, Skycatch, and Sentera, to name a few.

This past year we also saw an uptick in regulators and industry stakeholder partnerships. For example, the Drone Advisory Committee was created to provide the FAA with advice on unmanned aircraft integration from a diverse group of stakeholders. Major commercial participants include Intel, DJI, Amazon, Google X, and Facebook, as well the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association.

Consider also the FAA’s new UAS Integration Pilot Program. Here, government entities are partnering with private-sector companies, such as unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) operators and manufacturers, to submit proposals to the FAA to fly more advanced operations in their communities, including flying beyond line of sight and over people. This is significant because it’s clear that regulators want to include industry when creating policies.

However there is some good news / bad news with this.

The good news is greater flexibility. With vendor partnerships, drones will be able to perform more types of data gathering in a shorter timeframes and with more precision than many other options. So, more aircraft, sensor, and software integration.

The bad news is operators and businesses have regulatory uncertainty. We advise our clients to plan for some uncertainty as technology, the public, and bureaucracy find common ground on operations for beyond visual line of sight and over people. 

Challenges ahead

Here’s my list of the major challenges facing the drone industry in 2018:

1. Regulations: We may see more regulatory red tape—e.g., a patchwork quilt of rules as the FAA’s UAS Integration Pilot Program begins to make policy.
2. Public sentiment: Basic public concerns still exist about drone safety, security, privacy, and their public nuisance. My question is: How can we overcome this?
3. Business value: We’ve yet to see credible ROI that hits the executive scorecard. The key question is: What monetary benefit do drones and information gleaned from drones provide shareholder value?
4. Information accuracy: Up to now, drone vendors have been focused on the accuracy of image capture and the rigor of the drone system. For better business value, they need to focus on the accuracy of the data processing and the rigor of data analysis.
5. IT data governance: This is especially the case for drone inspections where a single drone could collect 50 to 100 gigabytes of data. Managing these large data sets starts to become one of the things that has to be worked out.
6. Automation: A lot of software automation will come, including artificial intelligence (AI) or algorithms that minimize the amount of human effort to distill all that information and get to some actionable inference. But large scale industrial use of AI is young and it requires manual intervention to distinguish the difference between near-similar objects.
7. Endurance: We’re still on the quest for efficiencies like better power sources or mixes.
8. Widespread business adoption: Business and industry adoption is growing, but it’s mixed because of factors such as business risk aversion, concerns over invasion of privacy, and a reluctance by many companies to share too much information about successes.

That’s it for now.

Listen to the companion podcast here http://bit.ly/2CXe6uK.

Look for a follow-up piece on our specific predictions for 2018, which will include investments, technology improvements, ecosystem partnerships, and software innovations.

If you have questions about what's in the report I mention or would like to comment, write me at colin@droneanalyst.com.

Image credit: Shutterstock

I believe three of the biggest misconceptions in the drone industry is how fast it will grow, which sectors will grow, and which ones will lag.

No one disagrees that drones—both consumer and professional—represent a new and emerging market. Drone market forecasts abound. We currently track 73 independent companies that provide market forecasts, and each of them projects growth for the drone or unmanned aerial system (UAS) sector that is nothing short of phenomenal. Some of these, however, are questionable, because, at the time they were written, there were no historical sales or reliable market survey data on which to create a proper forecast. We wrote about this problem back in 2015 here. Still, today we still see a big gap between current forecasts and actual purchases, services, and business adoption.

In this article, I’m going to take a look at some of the data collected in our latest report on the drone industry—data we think is important to you and answers the question: “Why don’t we see widespread adoption of drones in my industry just yet?”

Business use defined

As part of our 2017 Drone Market Sector Report, we conducted a survey to identify the business users for drone-based projects and which industries have traction. We define “business users” as those individuals or companies that use or purchase drone-based imaging or sensing services. A total of 623 respondents answered our qualifying survey question that they either do such work themselves or contract out for it.

When we asked respondents about the primary commercial drone-based service they perform or purchase, the results show that:

• the #1 business use is aerial photography and/or video at 31%,
• the #2 use is surveying / mapping / GIS with 20%,
• and the #3 use is construction (design, building inspection, or monitoring) at 6%.

Company size

To gauge the extent of drone use, we asked our business users about their company’s revenue, the number of projects they perform per month, and the number of remote pilots they employ. As with service providers, the numbers are low. For example, 75% of business users perform one to five projects per month.

The revenue figures of business users reveal an interesting trend as well. More than half (53%) are small and medium-size businesses (SMBs)—organizations with less than $10 million in annual revenue. Only 6% could be classified as a large enterprise, i.e., an organization that makes over $1 billion.

As we did with drone-based service providers, we asked these business users how many aviation-authority, licensed small UAS / UAV remote pilots they currently employ. The numbers were smaller than we expected. Almost three-quarters (74%) have five or fewer pilots; 50% have only one.

Certainly these numbers debunk the media hype about drones. There are not hundreds of thousands of drones flying now (certainly not at the same time), nor is it true that Millions More Drones Will Be Flying Above Your Head by 2020 and in this piece we make the case Why the Drone Network of Tomorrow is Farther Away Than You Think.

Limited success stories on integration

Our research finds widespread business adoption is being hampered by a reluctance to share too much information about successes.

Companies are depending on information communicated about drones by others that have been successful. Certainly the interest is there. You can see that from the diversity of industries attending the major U.S. commercial drone expos, such as InterDrone, Commercial UAV Expo, and Drone World Expo (which was just purchased by Commercial UAV Expo). Unfortunately, only a handful of companies (we estimate 75–100) are willing to come forward and present their use cases at these shows. Most of these presentations are not about companywide adoption, but rather about a particular, localized proof of concept.

There are positive messages in which the benefits of drones are explained, but communication about what a successful integration looks like is still very limited. Additionally, we find that companies that are already using drones are reluctant to share too much information, so they can continue to reap the benefits of their early investments. As a result of this reluctance to share information, further integration lags as companies wait on successful user stories that may never appear.

Bottom line

Unfortunately, the media all too often equates the business use of drones with drone delivery, and only reports on the headline-seeking efforts of Amazon, Google, and Facebook. There is so much more that’s actually happening, and it’s getting difficult to generate a comprehensive story on business use. Some of this can be attributed to the fact that many of the major industrial users are starting to focus only on the use cases that matter to them. The most concrete examples of this are the NAB Show, which brings together photography, video, and cinema professionals; the Energy Drone Coalition Summit, which is bringing together the major drone / UAV ecosystem players with the energy industry asset owners and end users; the American Society for Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing (ASPRS), which hosted a pre-conference UAS Technical Symposium this year at the Commercial UAV Expo, and will co-locate with the International LiDAR Mapping Forum in 2018.

That said, we will continue to do research on individual verticals and report growth and adoption issues.

If you have questions about what's in the report or would like to comment on it after reading it, write me at colin@droneanalyst.com.

Image credit: Shutterstock

This article first appeared on UAV Coach.

In this article we’re going to take a look at some of the data collected in the new report from Skylogic Research on the drone industry—data we think is important to you and answers the question: “Where are drone-based service providers making money?”

The report defines Service Providers as those individuals or companies that offer drone-based imaging or sensing services for outside hire (as opposed to Business Owners, who “use or purchase drone-based imaging or sensing services”).

Let’s dive in.

PRIMARY SERVICE AREAS FOR SERVICE PROVIDERS

Skylogic’s report found that the top three primary service areas for commercial drone work are: Aerial Photography / Videography; Surveying / Mapping / GIS; and Real Estate.

However, as indicated in the pie chart below, the first area (i.e., Aerial Photography / Videography) takes up the lion’s share not just of those three, but of the entire services scene, with 41% of the entire chart, while the following category (Surveying / Mapping / GIS) only receives 13%.

A note on the data: Respondents were asked to indicate the primary and secondary commercial product or services they offer. They could pick one primary and up to three secondary services. Skylogic intentionally had them choose a primary because previous research revealed that many service providers boast about their ability to service multiple industries, but have no domain expertise in those industries.

But just because the majority of commercial drone operators are working in aerial cinematography doesn’t mean they’re actually making money in that sector.

The report goes on to rank the top 10 drone services making over $100K/year. Surprisingly, it’s Surveying / Mapping / GIS that ranks first in that list. Aerial Photography and/or Video is #2. (Of course, just because you’re not making over $100K/year doesn’t mean you’re not making any money.)

After those first two, the third area listed where people are making over $100K/year is Utilities Infrastructure Inspection or Monitoring—even though this is the seventh item listed in the pie chart above, with only 3% of respondents indicating that they work in that field.

SO WHERE IS THE MONEY?

It seems one conclusion we can draw from these data points is that those commercial drone pilots who find a commercial niche (a place where there aren’t many people operating, but there is a demand for the work) are likely to make the most money.

Taking a simplistic view, a commercial operator could potentially look at those areas of minimal saturation on the pie chart—the ones lower down the list—and then look at those areas where people are making over $100K/year, and see what might be required to get into that sector.

Of course, transitioning into commercial mapping or inspections isn’t as easy as just knowing how to fly a drone. But we can foresee a future where solopreneurs team up with other professionals with specific skill sets—for example, a licensed surveyor—to provide high-end services to large industrial operations.

SERVICES MOST LIKELY TO BE OUTSOURCED

Another chart we want to share from Skylogic’s report shows the commercial areas where business owners are outsourcing services.

If you’re a solopreneur looking to find a skill set that will help you find work, this graphic could be a great jumping off place for finding skill sets you might want to develop.

The bottom line is that there is money to be made as a service provider in the drone industry, but the most popular field (i.e., aerial cinematography) is not the most lucrative, and the areas where you’re most likely to find a solid financial foothold will require additional skill sets beyond knowing how to fly and how to operate a camera.

It will be interesting to see the data in another year or two. Things are developing rapidly, with students beginning to study drones and STEM in high school and the landscape appearing to shift radically to focus more on industrial applications. We may soon see mapping, surveying, and similar commercial use cases rise to the top of the services areas for drone service providers, and we might also see a resulting shift in the market from cheap drones to high-end drones developed for niche applications.

Don’t have a copy of the report? Purchase a full copy of the report here.

We just announced the start of its 2017 Drone Market Sector Research, which promises to be our most comprehensive study of drone market trends and usage to date. The online portion of this research seeks to get your opinions about buying and using small unmanned aircraft systems—otherwise known as drones This independent research is being underwritten by Airware and DroneDeploy and is designed to uncover fresh insights on which drone industry sectors are thriving (and which aren’t) and how businesses are using drone-acquired data in their day-to-day operations.

Why are we doing this?

Because we believe the consumer and commercial drone market needs it. Our observations:

• We see a lack of objective information on the drone industry.
• We find there’s an absence of credible market-based research.
• We see little understanding of the difference between large industry forecasts and actual buyer adoption rates.

The survey will explore:

• Who’s buying what types of drones from which makers at which prices and for what use?
• How large are drone-based service providers and how and where are they positioning themselves to whom and which target industries?
• What concerns business buyers of drone-based projects most and why?
• How much are service providers and business buyers using flight management and data analytic software for image-based projects?

Who should take the survey?

• Individuals or businesses who have purchased a drone in the past 12 months for any reason
• Commercial drone service providers
• Businesses that use drones or drone services as part of their company’s internal work or projects

Take the brief 10-minute survey here: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/2017_drone_market

As an incentive for your participation in the survey, there will be an opportunity to:

• Receive a free summary report of the research results, a $95 value
• Enter to win a free DJI Spark Mini Drone (a $400 value) or one of two $100 VISA gift cards. 

When complete, the research study will provide a complete view of topics like:

• Critical industry drivers
• Vendor and service provider market share
• Business adoption trends and issues
• Market size for all drones and growth projections by segment

The survey will be in market for four weeks, and results will be available in September.

As always, I’m interested in hearing from you.  If have questions or comments, feel free comment below or email me at colin@droneanalyst.com.

Image: Shutterstock and Skylogic Research

As many of you know I’ve been researching and writing about agriculture drone solutions since early 2012. I recently came across this OpEd in PrecisionAg titled “Opinion: The Agricultural Drone War Is Over, And They Lost” and read it with great interest. Two and half years ago, our research indicated the same thing—that small drones might not be able to deliver more usable data to a farmer or provide a cost benefit over the existing image solutions available to them.

Even last year I had my doubts. In our June 2016 report, The Truth about Drones in Precision Agriculture, we looked at how drones have been used as remote sensing devices in agriculture thus far, reviewed competitive and traditional approaches using incumbent technology (like satellites and manned aircraft), and discussed the opportunities and challenges posed by the technology itself.

But a lot has changed since then.  Agriculture drones have matured, and so have the sensors and analytical solutions that support them.  A rising number of software vendors are targeting the agriculture space with increasingly useful solutions. And a new generation of drones is delivering much-needed functionality.

Not all agriculture drone solutions are created equal, so it pays to do a bit of research before committing. There are many factors to consider, from software compatibility to price to technical capabilities such as:

• Can you get all the components—drone, sensor, software, and analytics—from one company?
• Is an internet connection required in order to process data?
• Will it integrate well with your existing tools?

The research process to find the best solution can be overwhelming and time-consuming, but there is some good news. We’ve done a fair amount of this work already which you can access in our latest report, Using Drones to Ensure ROI in Precision Agriculture.  You’ll also find a checklist there to help you determine which solution is the best fit.  Here is an excerpt:

Nearly all agriculture drone solutions process RGB color, near infrared (NIR), and normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) data.  But not all solutions provide additional analytics and tools better matched to the needs of growers and agronomists. For example, only one solution we know of in the market allows users to view live NDVI data via streaming video while the drone is flying without an internet connection. This means you can more easily fly missions and see critical information at the field’s edge without requiring a trip back to the office. This eliminates a huge bottleneck. Most solutions require that you upload images from the UAV to a mobile device, a laptop or cloud service where they are stitched together to create a base map and the underlying spectrum data is processed into a usable NDVI layer.  In most solutions, you have to wait for that information—sometimes for hours. But with this solution, you don’t have to do that, and the added benefit is you can use the time savings to gather additional inputs from the areas the real-time map shows as suspect.

The report goes on to detail the following:

• The importance of timely inputs
• New analytics and tools
• The importance of an integrated solution—sensor, drone, and analytic data platform
• The challenges of understanding ROI
• The benefits of end-to-end solutions

You can get the report, plus an End-to-End UAV Solution Checklist for Precision Agriculture, here. 

Look for another report from us on this topic soon. If you have questions about the information in the report or would like to comment on it after reading, write me at colin@droneanalyst.com.

Image credit: Sentera

We just released a new research report (free) titled “Five Valuable Business Lessons Learned About Drones in Construction.” This is the first in a new series of white papers sponsored by BZ Media intended to share lessons learned in specific industries and how to maximize the value drones can deliver in those industries. This year, we are building on the analysis we did for the 2016 “Truth About” papers by incorporating real-world experience gained from businesses and drone pilots operating under the Federal Aviation Administration’s Small Unmanned Aircraft Regulations (aka FAA Part 107).

In the report, which is authored by Chris Korody, the founder of DroneBusiness.center, we demonstrate what drone operators servicing the architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC) industry have learned about what works and what doesn’t. We explore both the benefits and limitations of drones for Building Information Modeling (BIM) projects and offer practical advice to would-be adopters. We answer questions like: What have construction companies learned about creating their own internal drone operations groups? And where do we go or what can we expect from here?

Here is an excerpt:

“The $8.5 trillion global construction industry is both massive and far flung—there is no place in the world that does not build things. The industry’s problems reflect an age-old tradition of architects and engineers throwing plans over the wall to be reworked by contractors and subcontractors. It’s not that the system doesn’t work—it’s that the rework eats up increasingly thin margins, wastes huge amounts of material, and creates massive delays. And since much of it is on paper, trying to integrate and keep track of complex projects is no easy task.

In a June 2016 report, McKinsey quantified the problem: “Large projects across asset classes typically take 20 percent longer to finish than scheduled and are up to 80 percent over budget. Construction productivity has actually declined in some markets since the 1990s.” Of the 22 industries McKinsey analyzed, the construction industry is second to last; only agriculture has made less progress digitizing its workflows.

The sheer scale of the problem led Goldman Sachs to write that the first large-scale use of commercial drones will be in construction. It makes perfect sense. Visual line of site (VLOS) works just fine on construction sites. A growing group of software vendors are targeting the space with increasingly useful solutions. And a new  generation of drones is delivering much-needed functionality.”

The report goes on to detail the business lessons learned from drone-based projects done by hundreds of firms across the globe—not just for construction but also for engineering and architectural firms. It also provides insights from Richard Lopez, VDC (visual design construction) Manager at Hensel Phelps, a $3.1B 80-year-old construction company in Greeley, CO. 

You can get the free report here: http://www.interdrone.com/5_lessons_drones_construction?utm_source=Skylogic&utm_campaign=Construction%20White%20Paper%2017&utm_content=Construction

Airspace integration and management solutions for drones continue to garner new investment, but most options are based on fairytale scenarios and raise more questions than answers.

I’ve been doing research on the commercial drone industry since early 2012, and it never ceases to amaze me how much hype there is.  A week doesn’t go by where I find a new fantasy forecast or see an announcement on how this or that drone networking solution is “game changing.”

How real are those claims that drones will one day be filling our skies and delivering packages? Where and when will we see massive industry growth and is that growth dependent on the existence of a drone network?  In this post, I’ll go over a few misconceptions, discuss the harsh reality, and offer two lessons learned that I hope will help make the conversation a bit more rational.

The hype

Question: How much spin is out there on drone networks?  Answer: A lot.

Take this piece, for example: In The Drone Network of Tomorrow (It’s Closer Than You Think). The author wants you to believe that the drone network of tomorrow is a few hurdles away.  In this futuristic world, users will remotely dispatch multiple drones right from their offices. They’ll specify the flight path, and the drones will fly there autonomously and collect data. In this world, there will be drones-for-hire stationed at key locations and you will just click on button to summon them at your command. It will be “the Internet of drones” and it will be accomplished via the LTE network, the same network to which every smartphone is connected today.

Investors buy it.

Read The Big Money Continues to Bet on Drones, which discusses Verizon’s recent acquisition of Skyward. Read Airmap’s own take on their announcement of $26 million in Series B funding from Microsoft, Airbus, Qualcomm, Yuneec, and Sony, with Microsoft leading the round.

The press buys it.

Read this recent article in Recode. It says:

Drones are, after all, flying computers that connect to the internet—connectivity on a drone is often used to share flight information with other drones, report to air traffic control or send aerial imaging back in real time to the operator.

I bought it, too.

In December 2014, I wrote Why Drones Are the Future of the Internet of Things.

But since that time I’ve done a lot a research to find evidence supporting industry claims, and the truth is, at every turn I’ve come up empty handed and found many misconceptions.

Continue reading here:http://droneanalyst.com/2017/03/02/why-the-drone-network-of-tomorrow-is-farther-away-than-you-think/

Last year at this time, I reflected back on the news and trends of the commercial drone markets of 2015 and wrote about the mixed state of affairs in the U.S.  Back then we saw only 2,500 Section 333 grants for commercial activity, and the press’s narrative that ‘drones are cool’ turned to ‘drones are a privacy invasion headache.’ This was tempered by a proliferation of the drone conferences that had both exhibitors and vendors scrambling to attend. We also saw the outcome of the UAS Registration Task Force Aviation Rulemaking Committee and the FAA’s rapid implementation to put hobby drone registration in place.

In January 2016, I wrote a piece titled Six Trends Driving the Commercial Drone Market in 2016 and Beyond, which articulated that, while making predictions is not an exacting science, six trends would provide key opportunities and challenge for the industry:

1. Competition
2. Fidelity
3. Sensors
4. Mobility
5. China Incorporated
6. Virtual and Augmented Reality

In this post, I’ll review those trends as well as other significant news for drone manufacturers, service providers, and investors in 2016.

What rang true?

1. Competition

The biggest news all year was that the FAA Part 107 regulations are now in place. And they’re not as onerous as they could have been. Hurray! We (at least in the U.S.) have the basis for an industry and a firm regulatory framework upon which to grow.  And that’s what I saw and heard from so many companies that want to use drones for their businesses at the major drone shows.  So many were sitting on the sidelines waiting for regulations to be clear.

Several weeks ago, Patrick Egan of sUAS News wrote a piece called “Part 107 Your Golden Ticket” that sums my feelings and it’s this: There has been some grousing about what’s not in the rule. But there is plenty of work that can be done under this rule. The 10 years of uncertainty is over, and people can begin to offer services—from the real estate agent who wants aerial photos to the cellular company that wants tower inspection, to the insurance company that wants proper damage assessments, to the first responder who wants a better view of an incident. I think that’s exciting.

And so is having competition.  Many think it’s a race to the bottom on prices for drone-based business services–and that’s true in part–but the other side of the coin is there is healthy competition, which delivers customer benefits. Because everyone is working harder to produce a better product.

2. Fidelity

Continue reading here:  http://droneanalyst.com/2016/12/19/commercial-drone-markets-2016-year-in-review/

Sky-Futures cloud-based drone inspection visualization and reporting software squarely targets the asset inspection sector, but will it be broadly adopted? 

THE FACTS:

No one questions whether the founders of Sky-Futures know what they are doing.  When it comes to drone inspections they have “been there, done that.”  You can read about their history and where they are going in The importance of industrial experience when enabling enterprise with drone capabilities, a post written by co-founder & CEO James Harrison. I won’t repeat all the facts, just the salient one. 

When they started in June 2009, they assessed different markets, sizing them and then trying to forecast how they would look in 5 and 10 years’ time. They chose the drone inspection service market in the oil and gas (O&G) industry because of its highly inaccessible, highly hazardous and critical infrastructure, and its focus on safety and regulation. They succeeded in understanding the very specific needs of the industrial inspections market, got steady revenue stream, and have now turned to offering a software-as-a-service (SaaS) product as another generator of their future value. Their product is called Expanse^SM and is designed and built for drone-based operations management, inspections, data analysis, and reporting.

WHAT’S COOL AND WHAT’S NOT

There’s a lot to like about Expanse.  For one, it has an asset-centric view of the world—not an inspection-centric one.  In the inspection-centric view, reports provide little context for consumers of the information on the “who, what, where, and when” of problems. By taking the asset-centric view, Expanse starts with the “where” (a specific structure) and allows users to navigate to the areas of an asset that’s important to them—the “what,” like a rusty pipe or misaligned cell tower antenna. Everyone reading inspection reports has a different need (not everybody has responsibility for the integrity of pipes), so the software provides context.

Continue reading here:  http://droneanalyst.com/2016/12/15/is-sky-futures-expanse-drone-inspection-software-good-for-all/

AeroVironment’s new drone and cloud-based analytics platform squarely targets the commercial sector, but are they targeting the wrong vertical, too late in the game?

THE FACTS:

Earlier this month, the military and tactical unmanned aircraft systems manufacturer AeroVironment (NASDAQ:AVAV) proudly unveiled its new Quantix^TM drone and a cloud-based analytics platform called the AeroVironment Decision Support System (AV DSS™).  The combo is designed with the civil/commercial markets in mind. The drone is a hybrid design that enables the aircraft to launch vertically like a quadcopter and then transition itself for horizontal flight, taking advantage of a fixed-wing drone’s aerodynamic efficiency and range.  According to the company, the drone can map 400 acres in about 45 minutes, and its overall flight time is supposed to be an hour per battery.

The Quantix is a key piece to a larger end-to-end solution AeroVironment hopes will meet the needs of the agriculture, energy, and transportation industries, among others. Key to AeroVironment’s solution is a proprietary mobile interface that works with their secure cloud-based data storage.

WHAT’S COOL AND WHAT’S NOT

It’s great to finally see AeroVironment come out with an offering dedicated the commercial drones market.  While their Puma AE was used for aerial surveys in Alaska—and was the first time the FAA has authorized a commercial UAS operation over land, this product will be the first non-military product in their lineup. So, welcome. Or should I say—I’ll welcome you when you get here. Quantix won’t be available until Spring of 2017. And the price has yet to be announced.  However, in my conversations with the company at last month’s Drone World Expo, it’s clear some among their ranks understand it will need to be priced below $20K, or it’s simply not going to sell well.

Read more here: http://droneanalyst.com/2016/12/02/can-aerovironment-compete-in-the-commercial-drone-market/

DroneDeploy’s new App Market fills a need for commercial drone use, but can the data quality measure up for widespread industrial use?

THE FACTS:

This past week, DroneDeploy introduced its new App Market, a store for drone applications from a range of companies—including Autodesk, Box, John Deere, and 13 others—as well as a variety of industry verticals. Additionally, it includes applications from Airmap, Dronelogbook, Flyte, Kittyhawk, NV Drone, Skyward, and Verifly that help pilots and businesses manage drone operations and compliance.  In a nutshell, these apps enable enterprises and drone-based business service providers to automate their workflow and data integration with specialized tools built right within the DroneDeploy user interface.

In one way or another, the apps enable businesses to extend the capability of DroneDeploy’s automated mapping and online drone data services with apps that augment flight planning, logging, data analysis, export, and more. Apps appear in different areas of the DroneDeploy interface, depending on what they do, and you install them in your DroneDeploy account. For example, a flight planning app will appear in the flight planning interface, whereas an export or integration app may appear in the export menu. You can read about the details of this announcement here.

WHAT’S COOL AND WHAT’S NOT

The three apps that stand out in this announcement and make progress toward workflow goals are Autodesk, Box, and John Deere. In a generic sense, “workflow” is the...

Read more here: http://droneanalyst.com/2016/11/09/dronedeploy-enterprise-grade-or-not/

Innovations will flourish on drones that target the prosumer market for a long time

THE FACTS:

In the 1980 book, The Third Wave, futurologist Alvin Toffler coined the term “prosumer” when he predicted that the role of producers and consumers would begin to blur and merge. Today, the term is well accepted as a descriptor for camcorders, digital cameras, and similar goods. Prosumers are enthusiasts who buy products (almost always technical) that fall between professional and consumer-grade standards in quality, complexity, or functionality. Prosumer also commonly refers to those products.

Recently, a well-respected analyst mentioned that his firm thought that prosumer drones would disappear from the market in the near future. At the time, I thought this quite bizarre—because our research says exactly the opposite. I’m still shaking my head.

Earlier this year, we released “Drones in the Channel: 2016 Market Report,” a research study examining drone sales and distribution channels in North America. It’s the first in-depth study of drone sales that reveals the buying patterns of both consumers and professionals.  The report has a detailed analysis that calls into question the commonly held and often undefined prosumer term. I’ll summarize the salient points of that research and offer insights into why I think the prosumer drone is here to stay.

Continue reading here: http://droneanalyst.com/2016/10/26/the-prosumer-drone-will-never-die/

Choosing the right service means choosing a trusted business partner

• 4DMapper
• AirGon
• AgVault
• Airware
• DataMapper
• Drone2Map for ArcGIS
• DroneCloud
• Drone Data Management System™
• ...

Continue reading here: http://droneanalyst.com/2016/10/08/5-tips-for-evaluating-online-drone-data-services/

But development is vibrant, and you’ll see it work first in prosumer drones

THE FACTS:  

“Sense and avoid” for drones is a popular topic in the press right now, but the phrase can mean different things in different contexts and for different people. To clarify, there is a difference between solving the problem of “sense” and solving the problem of “avoid.”  Also, there is a difference between “airborne collision avoidance” (which is what most concerns the FAA) and “obstacle avoidance” (which is the problem that most manufacturers are trying to solve right now). With that in mind, this post looks at what a few manufacturers and software providers are doing to solve obstacle avoidance.

WHAT’S COOL AND WHAT’S NOT: 

DJI – DJI was one of the first to release a drone that could sense and avoid obstacles. In June 2015, they announced Guidance, a combination of ultrasonic sensors and stereo cameras that allow the drone to detect objects up to 65 feet (20 meters) away and stay away from objects at a preconfigured distance. The kit was immediately available for the Matrice 100 drone development platform.  They subsequently incorporated that technology into their flagship Phantom 4 prosumer drone but not their new professional drone, the Matrice 600.  

The Phantom 4 has front obstacle sensors combined with advanced computer vision and processing that allow it to react to and avoid obstacles in its path. The secret sauce for the Phantom 4’s ability to sense and avoid obstacles in real time and hover in a fixed position without a GPS signal is a set of specialized software algorithms for spatial computing and 3D depth sensing. These algorithms are coupled with an onboard Movidius vision processing unit (VPU) that gives the Phantom 4 drone the ability to sense and avoid obstacles in real time. In the “TapFly Mode” of the flight control program, the Phantom 4 obstacle sensing systems are supposed to enable you to fly a path with the drone automatically moving around objects as it flies. But you can find several real-world tests like this one that show it’s not a perfect system.

Intel – Intel is all over sense and avoid, and they accomplish it with active sensors...

Read more here: http://droneanalyst.com/2016/09/22/sense-and-avoid-for-drones-is-no-easy-feat/

This post first appeared in sUAS News ‘The Market’

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According to 2015 statistics from the US Department of Labor, there are 44,300 surveyors in the United States. But mapping is practiced by a larger population of cartographers, topographers, photogrammetrists, civil engineers, and geographers – it’s not exclusive to the surveying industry.  The American Society of Civil Engineers lists more than 150,000 members in 177 countries, and the Imaging and Geospatial Society has 7,000 supporters.  All of these disciplines can be grouped under a broader category called geographic information systems (GIS).  GIS professionals provide a wide variety of land-related services like identifying property boundaries, subdividing land, and surveying construction sites for placement of buildings. They also produce topographic and hydrographic maps, volumetric calculations for stockpiles, and flood insurance maps, among other services. 

The number of surveyors is actually projected to decline by two percent from 2014 to 2024 because of improved surveying technology.  Even though surveyors are a fraction of the broader population of GIS professionals, how will the improved surveying technology that is affecting them apply to that broader GIS population? And given the downbeat forecast for surveyors compared with the numerous upbeat billion dollar projections of drone use from the FAA and other industry observers, the question becomes, Where do commercial unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) or drones fit into the surveying technology mix?

With those questions in mind we just completed a study titled “The Truth About Drones in Mapping and Surveying,” The report is the fourth in series of studies that look objectively at each major commercial market for drones and drone technology. This report is co-authored by Bill McNeil, Contributor / Advisor, and Colin Snow, CEO and Founder, Skylogic Research, LLC, and it shows how small drones have been used successfully in surveying and mapping thus far and outlines the lessons learned. It goes on to discuss the opportunities and challenges for GIS professionals, reviews competitive and traditional approaches offered by incumbent technology, and discusses what’s next for drones in this sector.  Here is an excerpt:

“Drones are going to have a major impact on the surveying and mapping industry, but perhaps to a lesser degree on traditional surveyors.  As mentioned earlier, the Department of Labor is forecasting a 2% drop in the number of surveyors from 2014 to 2024.  On the other hand, the Labor Department is projecting 29% growth for the photogrammetry category.  This means more and more photogrammetrists will do surveying work and more surveyors will use photogrammetry tools for mapping.  In other words, inexpensive data collected from drones has and will continue to blur the lines between photogrammetry and mapping.

There is another issue at play here.  The process of physically flying a drone is not unique to map making.  The type of data collected is determined by the instrument payload -- not by the drone operator.  In other words, it really doesn’t make any difference if the application is precision agriculture or mapping a pipeline, the deliverables are the information extracted and processed by the crop consultant, the photogrammetrist, or the surveyor.

Drone technology is moving extremely fast.  It’s very possible many surveyors would rather hire a service provider to collect data than invest in a tool that can be obsolete is as little as six months.  They may also consider short-term leases to ensure their technology is relatively current or just rent a drone when needed.  Regardless of how small drones fit into the workflow, they will not only affect the industry, but they will also create new opportunities for independent contractors who, based on their experience, may be able to fly and collect data less expensively than surveyors.  The value add is the knowledge and data processing skills of the surveyor and photogrammetrist, not their drone-flying skills.”

You can get the free report here.

If you have questions about what's in the report or would like to comment on it after reading it, comment here or write me colin@droneanalyst.com.

Image courtesy of BZ Media.

This post first appeared in sUAS News 'The Market'

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It may not seem like it, but drones are still in their infancy and only proving themselves through the rigorous testing done privately, commercially, and by state and federal government agencies. Despite the tangible benefits that drones can provide, the public has mixed sentiments about their use by law enforcement, firefighting, and search & rescue operations. 

As early as 2012, this AP-NCC poll found a third of the public fears that police using drones for surveillance will erode their privacy.  But negative sentiment is changing.  In 2013, an Institute for Homeland Security Solutions (IHSS) and RTI International survey found 57 percent of the general public supports the use of unmanned aircraft systems for any application. It found:

• 88 percent of the general public supports drone use in search and rescue operations
• 67 percent support drone use in homeland security missions
• 63 percent support drone use in fighting crime

Nevertheless, despite fears by segments of the public and civil rights proponents like EPIC that broad use of drones heralds a domestic “surveillance state,” many more believe unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) provide tremendous benefits and dividends for public safety. This includes everything from traffic accident investigation, to forensics, to fire investigation and damage assessment.

With that in mind we just released our third research report series of studies that looks objectively at each major commercial market for drones and drone technology. This study titled “The Truth about Drones in Public Safety and First Responder Operations,” shows how drones have been used successfully by law enforcement, firefighters, and search & rescue thus far, reviews competitive and traditional approaches using incumbent technology, discusses the opportunities and challenges posed by regulations, outlines the lessons learned, and discusses what’s next for drones in this industry. Here is an excerpt:

“All these use cases are vital public safety matters that civilian market drones are well suited to handle. Cities, towns, and municipalities facing strained budgets and dwindling resources may more easily be able to afford small drones than traditional big ticket first response equipment and personnel. Consequently, drones will give some local governments a bigger bang for their buck.

But would-be adopters need to know that in the U.S., the Federal Aviation Authority (FAA) controls the skies and has created regulations (safety standards) governing the operation of aircraft. Thankfully, not all, but still some, of the Federal Aviation Regulations (“FARs”) apply to public aircraft. The FAA allows first responders with an FAA certificate of waiver the ability to create their own safety standards for the pilots, the aircraft, and maintenance. Additionally, first responders can choose to also operate under the newly created and liberal Part 107 small UAS regulations if that benefits their operations more.

In the U.S., it’s reported there are almost 18,000 state and local law enforcement agencies with at least one full-time officer or the equivalent in part-time officers.  That includes over 12,500 local police departments and over 3,000 sheriffs' offices, and 50 primary state law enforcement agencies. The National Fire Protection Association reports that in 2014, there was an estimated total of 29,980 fire departments, of which 19,915 (about two-third) were staffed only with volunteers.  Smaller law enforcement agencies and volunteer fire departments that have limited finances stand to benefit greatly because the price entry point has decreased for consumer drones (like the one pictured in Figure 3), their capabilities have increased, and the new liberal Part 107 regulations make it easier to legally operate.”

The report details major use cases and discusses the challenges and lessons learned by police and search & rescue teams including the lessons offered by Gene Robinson, head of Unmanned Aircraft Operations for the Wimberley Fire Department, from his work in the aftermath of the 2015 Texas Memorial Day floods.

You can get the free report here.

If you have questions about what's in the report or would like to comment on it after reading it, write me colin@droneanalyst.com.

Image courtesy of Gene Robinson

This post first appeared in sUAS News 'The Market'

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We just released a new report titled “The Truth about Drones in Construction and Infrastructure Inspection.” The report is the second in series of studies sponsored by BZ Media (creator of InterDrone Expo) that looks objectively at each major commercial market for drones and drone technology.

In this report we show how drones have been used successfully in construction and infrastructure asset management as aerial image and data capture devices thus far, review competitive and traditional approaches using incumbent technology, discuss the opportunities and challenges posed by the technology itself, outline the lessons learned, and discuss what’s next for drones in this industry. Here is an excerpt:

“Unlike The Truth about Drones in Precision Agriculture, where satellite and manned aircraft image services have been available to growers at low costs for years, construction and inspection professionals have had historically few options.  Up until now, the process for construction planning and documenting was mostly manual and done from the ground — and hiring helicopters or aircraft to take aerial images was either too costly or logistically impossible due to airspace restrictions.  The simple truth is small drones — in particular multirotors — can fly lower and closer than traditional aircraft and capture more useful detailed information.

In the inspection world, unmanned aircraft have a distinct cost and safety advantage over using people on ropes, ladders, scaffolding, and bucket trucks.  For example, a rope-access inspection at a wind farm can involve two or three workers who need at least half a day to get the job done in order to produce a series of photos for a report.  This can cost $1,200-$1,500 every 12-18 months – in addition to the costs incurred from shutting off the turbines for at least half a day (see details here).

There are many other examples of the benefit of drones vs. traditional approaches. This article points out that the Minnesota Department of Transportation (MDOT) recently completed a study on the benefits of using drones to inspect roads and bridges. MDOT estimated that a standard bridge deck inspection costs $4,600, takes eight hours, a crew of four people and heavy equipment. The same inspection with a drone takes just two people and two hours, at a significantly lower cost.”

The report goes on to summarize the proof-of-concept projects for drones done by hundreds of firms across the globe – not just for construction but also for civil infrastructure and asset management purposes.  We explore the major project types according to a commonly used building lifecycle framework of design, construction, operation, and demolition.

You can get a copy of the free report here

If you have questions about what’s in the report or would like to comment on it after reading it please comment below.

Thanks

Colin