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Increasingly present in skies all over the world, drones attract attention wherever they "fly". Today, we are going to bring eight very interesting updates from this highly promising and fast-paced market.
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Air Deliveries
With streets increasingly crowded with cars, one of the bets of the drone market is the product delivery service. Among the advantages are cost and flexibility, as drones do not require fuel and do not get stuck in traffic jams. In Brazil, this is already being tested: a Brazilian company that wants to deliver medicines conducted, this May, the first delivery test with drones in the country.
The experiment was conducted in São Paulo and was authorized by the Department of Air Space Control (DECEA). For the delivery, a hexacopter was used, which reaches up to 32 km/h, at a height of up to 15 meters. This drone model features an advanced system that ensures safety and practicality in delivery. Called the SMX-DLV-1, the hexacopter receives delivery coordinates through software and is connected to a remote control, in case there is a problem and the trip has to be interrupted.
Another company that conducted this type of test with drones was Amazon, in 2015. Due to the low weight of the goods the company offers, around 2kg, the service is highly favorable. The experiment took place during the day in Florida (USA), and the drone operator was properly licensed to control the machine, in addition to weather conditions favoring the delivery. Amazon stated that its expectation is for deliveries to be made in a maximum of 30 minutes, even in hard-to-reach locations.
The world's smallest drone
Some drones are developed just for their users' fun, without professional goals. This is the case of the world's smallest drone: the Skeye Pico Drone, from the Dutch company TRNDlabs. The drone is tiny, capable of being held with just one finger, and has no camera and cannot fly very far. It is accompanied by a controller, in which there is a special compartment to store it, and it can perform maneuvers, being a different option for having fun. The price is very friendly: only R$ 124.
The fastest drone in the world
Have you ever imagined a drone being faster than a racing car? The Drone Racing League, an organization that promotes drone competitions, tested the newest RacerX, which reached the mark of 289 km/h. The equipment broke a world record and is even faster than a Ford Mustang and a Chevrolet Camaro. This impressive speed is only possible thanks to the four TMotor 2500 kv engines, capable of spinning the propellers at 46 thousand revolutions per minute. The DRL broke its own world speed record, which was 136 km/h and belonged to the Racer 3. To be officially recognized by the Guinness World Records as the highest speed achieved on the ground by a battery-powered and remotely controlled quadcopter, the DRL RacerX had to fly a 100-meter course, after which an average of top speeds was calculated, reaching the official result of 263.1 km/h.
The most expensive drone in the world
The Ehang 184 is a steerable drone project by Chinese startup Ehang, which showed the concept at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, along with its hefty price tag of $300,000. The prototype model features futuristic chairs and a built-in tablet for controls. According to the company, the drone takes two hours to charge and can fly around you for about 23 minutes. It is not yet being marketed, as there has been no approval of the prototype so far.
Giant Drone
The well-known company Boeing recently built a "heavyweight" drone prototype. The aviation company announced that this model has the potential to change the way cargo is transported around the world. Dubbed the "unmanned electric vertical takeoff and landing cargo air vehicle prototype" — "eVTOL" — the drone impresses with its dimensions and specifications. Instead of the traditional four rotors, Boeing's giant drone is equipped with eight propellers. It measures 4.57 meters long by 5.49 meters wide and 1.22 meters high, weighing 317 kg, which allows it to carry up to 226 kg. For comparison, DJI's popular Phantom 4 is capable of carrying loads of up to 900 grams at most. This model is fully electric, has batteries designed by Boeing itself, and was built in three months, having passed testing in the US.
Drone that lands on walls
Named the Multimodal Autonomous Drone (S-MAD), the drone capable of landing on vertical surfaces is being developed by researchers at the University of Sherbrooke in Canada. Inspired by birds that use their wings to slow down during flight, the aircraft features laser and motion sensors and detects the wall automatically. The drone reduces its acceleration and uses a system of micro-spine claws to land in places that traditional drones cannot reach. One of the problems encountered with the equipment is that it is not capable of returning to its starting position. However, to solve this difficulty, the researchers use a maneuver known as pitch-up, which transforms the fixed-wing drone into a sort of helicopter. The S-MAD is, for now, only a functional prototype, but the project's goal is to enable companies and government institutions to gather information in locations where humans or any other machine cannot reach.
Life-saving drone
The first life rescue made by a drone occurred this year on a beach in Australia. Two young Australians were dragged away by a wave of about three meters and were 700 meters from the coast. A person walking on the beach raised the alarm, and two minutes later, the drone located the youths and dropped a buoy to the victims. The advantage of drones is that they move at 50 km/h, at a height of 60 meters, having a wide view of the water. The authorities said that a standard rescue would have taken about six minutes, whereas the drone only needed 70 seconds.
Fabio Caraça
Fábio Caraça is the Chief Growth Officer at Pix Force. He leads Pix Force's transformation into a scalable SaaS operation, combining strategic vision, culture, and high-impact execution.
