News

The International Organisation for Standardisation (ISO) recently approved the new international safety and quality standards for unmanned aircraft systems (UAS).

The new standards, a result of a 12-month consultation with drone professionals, academics, businesses and the general public, are set to have a massive impact on the future growth of the drone industry throughout the world.

The SESAR Horizon 2020 PODIUM project consortium has published its conclusions and recommendations for U-space in addition to all the supporting material. The project performed demonstrations of U-space services and technologies across five sites in Denmark, France and the Netherlands.

The PODIUM consortium poses for a photo

The EUROCONTROL-led SESAR Horizon 2020 PODIUM project reviewed its conclusions on U-space maturity and recommendations for deployment with an invited group of engaged stakeholders at EUROCONTROL Brussels on the 17th of October.

World first: skeyes, Belgium's Air Navigation Service Provider (ANSP), and the Belgian Civil Aviation Authority released Droneguide PRO today (September 12, 2019). Droneguide PRO automates the administrative process for professional drone operators and pilots via a web based application that automates flight planning, including flight requests, derogations and approval management. This is an important step towards the viability of the drone sector, providing a significant boost to the Belgian drone industry.

Sint-Truiden, Belgium, 5 September 2019 – The U-space SAFIR consortium, a group of 13 public and private organisations, hosted an open day at DronePort, Sint-Truiden today, successfully showcasing integrated drone traffic management for a broad range of drone operations. European Commissioner for Transport Violeta Bulc came to see the progress made.

On August 29, 2019, Volocopter demonstrated their electric air taxi performing a flight at Helsinki Airport in Finland, successfully integrated into both Air Traffic Management (ATM) and Unmanned Traffic Management (UTM) systems.

Photo: www.is.fi

Unifly is a contributing partner to the Gulf of Finland (GOF) project, one of six U-space demonstration projects. The Gulf of Finland (GOF) U-space demonstration project is funded by the SESAR Joint Undertaking. Unifly contributes to the project with its world-leading Unmanned Traffic Management (UTM) technology, alongside two other UTM providers.

Unifly NV, provider of the world’s leading unmanned traffic management (UTM) software for drone enablement, has completed a €17m Series B capital raise bringing in investors including Deutsche Flugsicherung (DFS - the national air traffic control authority of Germany) and FPIM (sovereign wealth fund of Belgium).

Unifly's most recent investor is Belgium's Federal Holding and Investment Company (SFPI-FPIM). FPIM centrally manages the federal government’s shareholdings, cooperates with the government on specific projects and pursues its own investment policy in the interests of the Belgian economy. It acquires equity in companies that are of strategic importance.

Existing investors Terra Drone (drone solution provider in Japan), QBIC and PMV (Belgian early stage investors) also participated in the round. Bryan, Garnier & Co., Europe’s growth investment bank, advised Unifly on this transaction.

Unifly is the leading provider of UTM software worldwide, enabling the tracking and management of drones alongside commercial aviation in order to provide visibility on where drones can fly, request and provide flight approvals, manage potential conflicts and implement regulations including no-fly zones.

On June 25th, Unifly had the honor of winning A1 Telekom Austria's Internet of Things Challenge. The challenge consisted of an initial remote pitch and a final pitch of the top 5 companies in front of a jury to determine the winner.

Great organisations rise when faced with a challenge.  And what a challenging week it was!