As commercial applications become more apparent and legal restrictions are loosened, drone usage in businesses is rising. From 2016 to 2017, the use of enterprise drones surged by 58%, with the sectors leading the way being construction, mining, agriculture, surveying, and real estate. According to McKinsey, the $1 billion commercial drone market’s economic impact in 2017 will triple to $31 billion by 2026 if the current trend continues.
In particular, businesses in the construction, mining, and utilities sectors have adopted drones for various uses, including photography. According to a Drone Industry Insights analysis, drones’ top four corporate uses are localization and tracking, cinematography, inspection, and mapping and surveying. Even the best drones have a limited range and capacity, so they aren’t a perfect technology, but respondents to the research claimed that using drones helped them save money and time.
Know about drones used for inspection
In 2021, Jeremy Suard and Ido Gonen co-founded Exodigo. Suard headed AI and deep learning teams with expertise in signal processing and acoustic engineering while they both worked for the Israeli Military Intelligence. Before joining the military, Gonen worked as a teaching assistant at Technion, the Israel Institute of Technology, in Haifa.
Companies frequently use third-party providers, such as PrecisionHawk, DroneDeploy, and DroneBase, to manage their drone operations. Exodigo, a recent market participant, asserts that its software can produce 3D maps of subterranean cables, pipes, soil layers, rocks, minerals, and groundwater. The business also revealed that its platform is now available. It has received $29 million in seed funding from investors, including SquarePeg Capital, JIBE Ventures, Tidhar Construction, Israel Canada, and WXG Ltd., co-led by Zeev Ventures and 10D Ventures.
Learn about expanding market demand
According to a 2018 Software program survey, 26% of small to midsize development organizations currently use drones in their operations or plan to do so by 2020. Join the poll. According to Insider Intelligence, global exports will reach 2.4 million in 2023. And the global market for drones used for development and mining alone may eventually reach $28.3 billion.
Exodigo competes with Emesent, which develops software that enables drones to map underground spaces independently. Inkonova, a Swedish business, also asserts that it has created autonomous inspection drones for underground mining. Beyond drone-based solutions, companies like 4M Analytics and Pulse Utility map utilities are buried deep beneath the ground using various sensor technologies.
Suard contends that the accuracy and quickness of Exodigo’s solution set it apart. Construction, mining, utilities, and other sectors are some of the top use cases for AI platforms, but the potential is far more significant in the future. The imaging technique has no limitations, according to him. Applications can be as local as helping to support rescue efforts after collapses of structures like buildings, tunnels, or mines; they can also be as remote as building transportation tunnels for the next generation of robotic digging crews or supporting space exploration missions like the Mars Rover.
Final thoughts
Drones have been adopted by businesses in the development, mining, and utility sectors, among others, for various uses, including photography. According to a Drone Business Insights analysis, there are numerous important reasons why businesses employ drones, including inspection, mapping and surveying, cinematography, localization, and monitoring. Even though even the best models of drones have limited range and performance, respondents to the research stated that using drones allowed them to reduce costs and save time.
Subsurface mapping is a difficult task. According to a 2021 research study, it can be particularly challenging to detect dirt underneath since soil absorbs or attenuates a large portion of the electromagnetic spectrum, making it impossible for sensors to detect anything but the surface of the soil. Exodigo, which is in pre-revenue and has pilot projects planned for California, Florida, and Texas in the coming weeks, said it would utilize the financing to support growth with a focus on assembling a California-based team.