3DR, North America’s largest consumer drone manufacturer, launched a new third party product partnership program called “Made for Solo” at GITEX Technology Week in Dubai. The Made for Solo program supports companies that want to leverage 3DR’s Solo TM “Smart Drone” platform and its open hardware bays and dual computer processing power. Made for Solo also offers partners access to 3DR’s technical and research resources and official 3DRendorsement of a product’s compatibility with Solo. The program also marks the beginning of the “drones &” movement, as companies across an array of industries will now begin applying new and purpose built hardware and software to drones for a variety of specific uses; Made for Solo provides these partners with the easiest way to get started on drone development.
“In the past, drone development was limited to dedicated engineering departments within drone companies themselves,” says Chris Anderson, CEO of 3D Robotics. “We’re excited that our open platform is already paying dividends with Made for Solo, opening opportunities for drone development to a range of companies from a range of industries. We’re about to experience a real sea change in this industry.”
Several new Made for Solo accessories are already in the program and will soon be showcased on the 3DR website. Additionally, 3DR is announcing the first three major Made for Solo industry partnerships—Epson, Kodak and Fiilex—who already have Solo accessory products under development and scheduled for later release.
“Fiilex is very excited to enter the emerging drone market by leveraging the Made for Solo program,” said Brent Siebenaler, Brand Manager of Fiilex. “We’re looking forward to creating some great and innovative lighting products for Solo.”
“We’re excited by the launch of the Made for Solo program and have been busy perfecting a suite of augmented reality flight assistance tools,” said Eric Mizufuka, product manager, Moverio AR Glasses for Epson America.“The Made for Solo program is a great opportunity for Epson to gain direct access to 3DR’s top pilots, makers, and developers.”
And Paul Meyhoefer, VP of Marketing & Product Development for JK Imaging Ltd., said, “The Made for Solo Program has opened the Virtual Reality door for our KODAK PIXPRO SP360 Action Cams to be used in a variety of new ways. “Matched with Solo, the SP360’s ability to capture 360° full spherical video with its unique lens and perspective lends itself perfectly to being a vital tool for creatives to develop and take their VR to new heights.”
Made for Solo is accessible to any company or individual that wants to take their technologies to the sky. All interested parties can apply to the program through a form available on the company’s website3dr.com/MFSapply. The company expects the program to continually grow and evolve, with Solo evolving in step with it.
“The Made for Solo program is the beginning of what we think will be an exponential expansion of our ecosystem, with many companies both in the drone industry and in other industries adopting the Solo platform,” said Colin Guinn, CRO of 3D Robotics. “From the beginning we’ve made the promise to customers that Solo will be more than just a drone, it will be a platform for aerial innovation, and it’s exciting to see that promise coming to fruition so quickly. Honestly, there’s been a deluge of these new products, and we can’t wait to see what creative people and companies will do now to enhance the Solo experience.”
In conjunction with these efforts, 3DR also offers comprehensive developer support on multiple levels. At the highest level, dev.3dr.com offers all of the resources for anyone to develop on Solo. Inside dev.3dr.com is 3DR’s open software development platform called DroneKit , which is a streamlined and simple interface that allows anyone to create customized drone apps.
When combined with the Made for Solo program, these resources make it easy for developers anywhere to tap into new Made for Solo products and contribute even more functionality. And because the company has its roots in the largest open robotics community in the world — diydrones.com — it expects that this development community will contribute to exponential advancements through the synthesis of open hardware and open software that the Made for Solo program will catalyze.
You can learn more about the Made for Solo program by visiting 3dr.com/MFS .
Comments
It's a great idea, the more vendors on board for the solo the better for 3dr, and the better for the diydrones community which is largely funded by 3dr. The Solo is a mostly open platform, hopefully it will become more open over time, and apart from the cost which is still a bit high for me it's a very exciting platform.
I wonder if the electronics (as in the pixhawk2 and the companion board) will be available separately at some point, then it would gain huge momentum. I suspect not as I doubt the business model would allow it, but we can but dream :) If not, I wonder if the commercial 3dr offerings and the opensource side of things will grow further and further apart..
make for solo now is like made for iphone... without open source paradigm i don't even bother to buy a solo. the enthusiastic to make a pixhawk port to raspberry pi is long gone... diydones is now diy part for drones.
Great idea. I'm always surprised that people seem to not understand the tremendous significance of the open approach that 3DR has taken over the years.
OT - I like the photo of Chris. Nice to see something a bit different.