25 ms·

Drone Bubble Bursts, Wiping Out Startups and Hammering VC Firms

215 points by prostoalex 7y ago

romwell 7y ago
TFA in two sentences (quote): * Federal regulation of the aircraft has been slow to catch up, and is holding back many businesses from expanding. * Non-drone companies across industry pull their unmanned aerial operations in-house In short: there is no drone bubble. There is a short-term investment bubble.
- umeshunni 7y ago
  Another reason (the article didn't delve deeper into) is that the drone hardware market itself consolidated and non-Chinese manufacturers just got outcompeted and wiped out.
1387493948 7y ago
Every day on cnn, cheesy computer generated images of drones delivering produce to urban food desserts. Drones! Package delivery is just around the corner! Look, a drone taxi service! They have one precarious prototype and no basis in economic reality. But their leader wears a turtle neck and drinks Raw Water and only he is able to understand how the economy of tomorrow works. Silly us and our pragmatism. Turtle neck man sells and in the end he gets away with millions and the rest of us stand in a crater where a billion dollars of intelligently invested money could have made a real difference in people’s lives. Where will turtle neck man show up next?
- dang 7y ago
  Please don't post unsubstantive rants to HN. We're here to learn things we didn't already know. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
  - 1387493948 7y ago
    Fuck you bitch
  - harry8 7y ago
    https://www.google.com/search?biw=1920&bih=949&tbm=vid&ei=lE1wXei_GJbD3LUPldq0kA8&q=cnn+drones+delivery+&oq=cnn+drones+delivery+&gs_l https://www.google.com/search?biw=1920&bih=949&tbm=vid&ei=lE... Subtantiating that CNN are pretty bad on this front. It seems to me that if anyone should be pouring scorn on unsubstantiated techno-hype it's all of us here. People doing startups have the most to lose when snake-oil salesmen have their way and dominate the discussion. When the market then implodes we're left without funding and support for real technology that makes the word better. We get the reputational hit for BS we were no part of. Forgive us if those of us who are serious about technology and reality feel just a little emotional about that. It needs to be called out by the knowledgable every time. Especially when everyone who posts regularly here knows it to be true. Hype for snake-oil-tech is poison for us as a community, if indeed that is what we are.
    - harry8 7y ago
      People obviously disagree with the above. I must say I am utterly baffled as to why. Snake oil hype is poison for your startup unless you're in snake oil yourself. "For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." --Richard Feynman You've probably seen that before too, or at least should have. Still worth repeating, often, in hype bubles of which there is clearly one surrounding drone delivery. At least I'm not trying to do something genuine, honest and real in that space. Must make things borderline impossible if you are.
    - dang 7y ago
      > It needs to be called out by the knowledgable every time. Sure, but the way to do that is by sharing what one knows.
neonate 7y ago
http://archive.is/COKtH http://archive.is/COKtH
tylerchilds 7y ago
Anecdotally, I never got into drones because of the batteries. Everyone I met that had them absolutely loved them, but had like 4 batteries they needed to keep charged for about 15 minutes of flight time. And quite a few tried pushing that a little too long an ended up with crashed drones. So my half cent is that batteries need to get better before people like me even consider them. Mentioned 0 times in that article. Alternatively, drones need to get efficient enough to be solar powered, which is maybe the intent behind the acquisitions by PrecisionHawk Inc. https://www.precisionhawk.com/blog/media/topic/precisionhawk-acquires-both-hazon-inc-and-inspectools-inc-becoming-the-leading-provider-of-drone-technology-and-analytics-for-the-energy-market https://www.precisionhawk.com/blog/media/topic/precisionhawk...
- nostalgk 7y ago
  This. I recently worked with a company that produces drones among other things, and spoke with the head of research there. More or less, they said they had given up on putting money into drone R&D until battery technology caught up, as they had plenty of ideas that they believed in but were unfeasible due to battery life.
  - libria 7y ago
    As RC vehicles {car|helicopter|plane} get larger they reach a certain mass where liquid fuel - usually a petroleum - is preferable to battery. Why is this not an alternative for drones?
    - terravion 7y ago
      Indeed this has been done since WWI. https://www.warhistoryonline.com/military-vehicle-news/short-history-drones-b.html https://www.warhistoryonline.com/military-vehicle-news/short...
      - libria 7y ago
        Let me rephrase: why would companies consider battery life a limit when liquid fuel is a viable way forward for range, time-aloft or size?
erobbins 7y ago
We are now entering the trough of disillusionment. In a few years some real novel and amazing companies will emerge and drones will find their useful place in society.
- danboarder 7y ago
  This. Now is a great time to innovate drones. The developments in FPV drone tech are happening fast and it's mind blowing. For example, 50sec into this clip: https://youtu.be/-AL5S3g03qw https://youtu.be/-AL5S3g03qw Stay tuned, drones are just getting started.
  - meheleventyone 7y ago
    That doesn’t seem to be so much an innovation in tech as innovation in piloting and video editing?
    - danboarder 7y ago
      No, we have had great pilots and editors for years. The new gen FPV hardware has low latency HD for the first time this year, with better dual gyro flight controllers on faster chips, faster ESC chips and new FC & ESC software for superior filtering. Lots of developments like Neuroflight firmware are also very new, it's all amazing when you dig into it. Also new this year are tiny fpv racing cinewhoops that are 4k capable and fit in the palm of your hand, and fly around 100mph... https://github.com/wil3/neuroflight https://github.com/wil3/neuroflight
asteli 7y ago
Most of the good ideas are either massively competitive (aerial inspection/ag support/photography), a pain in the ass due to safety regulatory issues (drone delivery, passenger flight), or just bad ideas overall (consumer camera that flies around and tries to follow you). There are occasionally bursts of genius in the field though. A few years ago I met a guy (Sergei at Fotokite, I believe), who was developing a tethered drone for photojournalism. Solves many problems at once: you don't run out of battery, you could control the drone via a stick or just pulling it around by the tether, people don't hate the drones as much when they can see the operator. He demonstrated it by deploying it in the reception area of an office building, probably 15x15ft. Now apparently they're developing a tethered drone for first responders that automatically deploys and gives you a 150' vantage point for situational awareness. BTW: No relation to Sergei or Fotokite, just impressed with their tech.
- jcims 7y ago
  I need one for point to point internet link to my home out in the boonies. 10M/768k DSL isn't cutting it any more.
  - dehrmann 7y ago
    10Mbps DSL means you're two miles from a central office. For $20,000 per mile (maybe less?), you can get fiber run to your house. A friend actually did this.
    - semi-extrinsic 7y ago
      Ubiquiti sells you a pair of AirFibre gigabit microwave links for $3000. I'm sure you can rent a little tower space with fiber internet for a very long time for $36k.
      - jcims 7y ago
        This is the way i will go if i do anything. Got a quote of $9k for an 80’ freestanding tower to get over the tree canopy where i live. Then it’s just hardware costs plus probably $500/mo for gig internet plus antenna placement in town. I could easily sell 100M to 4-5 neighbors for $100/mo.
acollins1331 7y ago
Drones are huge in my department at school for collecting data with lidars and multispectral cameras. New drone techs for VC firms to invest in are going to need better technology, but a huge rollout of drones being used by everyday companies to do this is still in it's infancy. It's a good time to be someone graduating with experience with UAVs.
- nomel 7y ago
  > for collecting data with lidars and multispectral cameras What's the use case for this data?
  - acollins1331 7y ago
    The numbers of uses are too large to count. I'll give one example: The DOT in my state has given large grants to use lidar from UAVs to be able to automatically identify wetlands.
heyflyguy 7y ago
Much of the drone industry circa 2009 - 2013 suffered from the exact same symptoms...develop awesome tech and then find a use case. I know of 3 that ran out of money before finding a way to even make money. sad but great lessons for anyone involved.
breck 7y ago
I was very excited about drones until https://www.boringcompany.com/ https://www.boringcompany.com/ came out. Moving things underground makes 1000x more sense.
lacker 7y ago
DJI is still valued at around $15 billion, right? To me it seems less like a drone bubble burst, and more like a single winner has emerged from round one.
- RRRA 7y ago
  They just got into FPV and I really hope they fail with their lock-in DRM, for the sake of keeping the maker spirit and FOSS innovation around in that field...
  - gear54rus 7y ago
    Anything to read on that DRM? Google doesn't give much.
    - mlevental 7y ago
      they used to have an open platform so you could bring your own flight controller. the most recent gen of their platforms locks you into their flight controllers (and their shitty api).
      - ahartmetz 7y ago
        Heh. I have seen someone doing incredible maneuvers with crazy accelerations using a homebuilt drone. Compared to commercially available drones it's like an F1 car versus a tractor.
- bdcravens 7y ago
  I think the drone industry is to a drone producer what the cloud is to hard drive manufacturers. Many of the startups were creating value adds atop DJI.
_bxg1 7y ago
> Unmanned aircraft are still seen as a pillar of the future. But for now, all that over-heated enthusiasm is getting a cold blast of reality. Just waiting for the same to happen with AI.
- streetcat1 7y ago
  AI is hyped from the fifties. It might be the real thing today.
  - _bxg1 7y ago
    It was hyped in the 80s, and real advances were made, and then it crashed. Now it's hyped again, and real advances are being made, but it's still set to crash again. The problem is that "AI" is too big and romanticized a term. Symbolic reasoning is a real technology; neural nets are a real technology; AI is at best science fiction, at worst marketing fluff. So despite having some real substance, the hype still outpaces the reality.
    - streetcat1 7y ago
      How is it set to fail again. Previous times the hardware was not there, now it is.
ingenieroariel 7y ago
Interesting that they did not mention 3DR. https://3dr.com/ https://3dr.com/ They went from selling the hobby 3DR Solo (which I own and love) to focusing entirely on the government side.
appleshore 7y ago
Zipline raised a $190m at a $1.2b valuation. Someone who seems credible (works for the government) told me their business model was questionable.
emcq 7y ago
The folks at Skydio are building something different. It's the first autonomous thing (car, boat, plane, drone, etc) that's widely available to consumers. They're releasing a new product soon and if it's better than what they had before DJI or anyone else won't be remotely close to having a similar product. Maybe a lot of the weaker companies have folded, hardware is hard, but would be very sad to see the innovation happening there collapse at this point.
- blt 7y ago
  Skydio has really good tech, if anything I guess they need to figure out how to get the price down.
ChuckMcM 7y ago
This is a typical startup contraction. Remember when the "PC bubble burst" and dozens of companies went bust, all with similar but slightly different business plans. It turned out that being able to execute efficiently was the winning strategy, not features, not fancy graphics, not custom cases. Just ruthless efficiency. A couple of years ago I went to UAV expo in Las Vegas and even then it was clear that a lot of drone companies were technology looking for a use case. And there were demonstrations of drones that did things much better (like mapping a traffic accident scene) than existing technology that saved both time and got the highways re-opened faster. Racing them with PoV cameras continues to be a lot of fun, it just isn't the multi-billion dollar sport yet, give it time.
- TheSoftwareGuy 7y ago
  People always seem to underestimate the power of boring efficiency
- dehrmann 7y ago
  > technology looking for a use case Did someone say blockchain?
  - faissaloo 7y ago
    Blockchain already has a usecase: currency That's it, it's that simple
    - Cthulhu_ 7y ago
      Except that that's already failed; it's used as an investment product, a get-rich-quick scheme, dealing in illegal products and services, untraceable exchange of currency (e.g. ransomware) and money laundering. Nobody pays with crypto. Except people that made a lot of money off of crypto and have a vested interest in its success.
      - kirsebaer 7y ago
        Illegal products is an enormous market.
droithomme 7y ago
The FAA's licensing requirements for even toy craft killed this sector. Good news though, it's going incredibly strong overseas such as in Yemen where they've bought Chinese made drones and rapidly upgraded them into a domestic high tech military drone manufacturing capability... with 1000 mile ranges and bomb carrying capability. So drone fans might not be able to do their thing in the US, and the US might thus not have anyone locally that has a passion for drones, or is able to advance US drone technology, but the tech advances ... elsewhere.
- itsyaboi 7y ago
  Do you have any links that talk about this in more detail? Modifying a off-the-shelf drone (assuming you mean quad copter here, not a fixed wing craft) to have a 1000 mile range seems like quite the feat...
benboughton1 7y ago
I traveled to the US in 2014 on a sponsored trip to research drones for agriculture. My report covered off on some of the technical challenges rather than the business side of it. You could see even in 2014 everyone had great ideas but profitable execution was going to be so hard. My report is here for a look back in time http://www.nuffieldinternational.org/rep_pdf/1438074605BenBoughtonNuffieldReport_Final.pdf http://www.nuffieldinternational.org/rep_pdf/1438074605BenBo... . I then went on to start a business processing and providing satellite imagery in agriculture because I couldn't figure out a business model that would work for drones.
Fr0styMatt88 7y ago
I have a first-gen Parrot AR.Drone collecting dust. Great fun initially until I started reading about flyaways and then got too worried to actually fly the thing outside. Even nowadays I get the impression this issue was never solved. At the time it seemed like one of those widely-reported but never admitted-to things. I never understood why the software wouldn't just go into a fixed landing routine if the control signal was lost or if a watchdog tripped. Still really curious about that actually, if anyone here knows more technical details. So yeah that and the battery was never good enough. Now I look at drones and it seems like you have either really really cheap, subpar options or incredibly expensive DJI-quality drones. Something that costs around $300.00 AUD and that could fly for half an hour at a time would be a great toy, but I get that the tech isn't there. So I end up feeling like they're great tech that's ultimately killed by a thousand little tradeoffs. At least for me; if I was into video then one would be great for some things. That's a limited market in the end though, I think.
- closetohome 7y ago
  Man, I haven't heard of a flyaway in years. I always assumed it was just pilot error that the pilot blamed on the drone. Certainly saw enough of those situations that it's more believable than a phantom software issue.
malicioususer11 7y ago
literally: the fault of the EPA. Not Joking.
vsgzusnex 7y ago
My guess is fully autonomous drone products will prevail. The capabilities today are already incredible and the mobility lends itself to generalize to solutions that weren't previously possible. They could be one of the first kind of robotic agents that we regularly interact with in our lives besides automobiles. Skydio - https://www.theverge.com/2018/4/5/17195622/skydio-r1-review-autonomous-drone-ai-autopilot-dji-competitor https://www.theverge.com/2018/4/5/17195622/skydio-r1-review-... Shield AI - https://www.shield.ai/nova https://www.shield.ai/nova Battery life is certainly an issue but even before a major breakthrough happens 10-20 minutes is a long enough flight time for a lot of autonomous tasks. Plus what if they dock and charge themselves? I think they're going to continue getting smaller, more power efficient, and cheaper and it will continue to open up possibilities.
Qu3tzal 7y ago
ACSL (acsl.co.jp) is the first drone-making startup to enter Tokyo's exchange. They seem to have clients and are making money. They do B2B drones though, maybe this article was too focused on B2C companies.
buboard 7y ago
People talk a lot about the tech bubble and forget the VC bubble
carc1n0gen 7y ago
It kept getting harder and harder for me to legally use my drone. I own a parrot drone that weighs 500g. That uses to be the upper limit to not need an aviation license or certificate of some kind, and Insurance. Now 250g and up have those requirements, so I just stopped using it. I only used it once every few months for some arial footage anyway.
zelly 7y ago
Next is deep learning.

215 points by prostoalex 7y ago

TFA in two sentences (quote): * Federal regulation of the aircraft has been slow to catch up, and is holding back many businesses from expanding. * Non-drone companies across industry pull their unmanned aerial operations in-house In short: there is no drone bubble. There is a short-term investment bubble.

umeshunni 7y ago
Another reason (the article didn't delve deeper into) is that the drone hardware market itself consolidated and non-Chinese manufacturers just got outcompeted and wiped out.

1387493948 7y ago

Every day on cnn, cheesy computer generated images of drones delivering produce to urban food desserts. Drones! Package delivery is just around the corner! Look, a drone taxi service! They have one precarious prototype and no basis in economic reality. But their leader wears a turtle neck and drinks Raw Water and only he is able to understand how the economy of tomorrow works. Silly us and our pragmatism. Turtle neck man sells and in the end he gets away with millions and the rest of us stand in a crater where a billion dollars of intelligently invested money could have made a real difference in people’s lives. Where will turtle neck man show up next?

dang 7y ago
Please don't post unsubstantive rants to HN. We're here to learn things we didn't already know. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- 1387493948 7y ago
  Fuck you bitch
- harry8 7y ago
  https://www.google.com/search?biw=1920&bih=949&tbm=vid&ei=lE1wXei_GJbD3LUPldq0kA8&q=cnn+drones+delivery+&oq=cnn+drones+delivery+&gs_l https://www.google.com/search?biw=1920&bih=949&tbm=vid&ei=lE... Subtantiating that CNN are pretty bad on this front. It seems to me that if anyone should be pouring scorn on unsubstantiated techno-hype it's all of us here. People doing startups have the most to lose when snake-oil salesmen have their way and dominate the discussion. When the market then implodes we're left without funding and support for real technology that makes the word better. We get the reputational hit for BS we were no part of. Forgive us if those of us who are serious about technology and reality feel just a little emotional about that. It needs to be called out by the knowledgable every time. Especially when everyone who posts regularly here knows it to be true. Hype for snake-oil-tech is poison for us as a community, if indeed that is what we are.
  - harry8 7y ago
    People obviously disagree with the above. I must say I am utterly baffled as to why. Snake oil hype is poison for your startup unless you're in snake oil yourself. "For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." --Richard Feynman You've probably seen that before too, or at least should have. Still worth repeating, often, in hype bubles of which there is clearly one surrounding drone delivery. At least I'm not trying to do something genuine, honest and real in that space. Must make things borderline impossible if you are.
  - dang 7y ago
    > It needs to be called out by the knowledgable every time. Sure, but the way to do that is by sharing what one knows.

neonate 7y ago

http://archive.is/COKtH http://archive.is/COKtH

tylerchilds 7y ago

Anecdotally, I never got into drones because of the batteries. Everyone I met that had them absolutely loved them, but had like 4 batteries they needed to keep charged for about 15 minutes of flight time. And quite a few tried pushing that a little too long an ended up with crashed drones. So my half cent is that batteries need to get better before people like me even consider them. Mentioned 0 times in that article. Alternatively, drones need to get efficient enough to be solar powered, which is maybe the intent behind the acquisitions by PrecisionHawk Inc. https://www.precisionhawk.com/blog/media/topic/precisionhawk-acquires-both-hazon-inc-and-inspectools-inc-becoming-the-leading-provider-of-drone-technology-and-analytics-for-the-energy-market https://www.precisionhawk.com/blog/media/topic/precisionhawk...

nostalgk 7y ago
This. I recently worked with a company that produces drones among other things, and spoke with the head of research there. More or less, they said they had given up on putting money into drone R&D until battery technology caught up, as they had plenty of ideas that they believed in but were unfeasible due to battery life.
- libria 7y ago
  As RC vehicles {car|helicopter|plane} get larger they reach a certain mass where liquid fuel - usually a petroleum - is preferable to battery. Why is this not an alternative for drones?
  - terravion 7y ago
    Indeed this has been done since WWI. https://www.warhistoryonline.com/military-vehicle-news/short-history-drones-b.html https://www.warhistoryonline.com/military-vehicle-news/short...
    - libria 7y ago
      Let me rephrase: why would companies consider battery life a limit when liquid fuel is a viable way forward for range, time-aloft or size?

erobbins 7y ago

We are now entering the trough of disillusionment. In a few years some real novel and amazing companies will emerge and drones will find their useful place in society.

danboarder 7y ago
This. Now is a great time to innovate drones. The developments in FPV drone tech are happening fast and it's mind blowing. For example, 50sec into this clip: https://youtu.be/-AL5S3g03qw https://youtu.be/-AL5S3g03qw Stay tuned, drones are just getting started.
- meheleventyone 7y ago
  That doesn’t seem to be so much an innovation in tech as innovation in piloting and video editing?
  - danboarder 7y ago
    No, we have had great pilots and editors for years. The new gen FPV hardware has low latency HD for the first time this year, with better dual gyro flight controllers on faster chips, faster ESC chips and new FC & ESC software for superior filtering. Lots of developments like Neuroflight firmware are also very new, it's all amazing when you dig into it. Also new this year are tiny fpv racing cinewhoops that are 4k capable and fit in the palm of your hand, and fly around 100mph... https://github.com/wil3/neuroflight https://github.com/wil3/neuroflight

asteli 7y ago

Most of the good ideas are either massively competitive (aerial inspection/ag support/photography), a pain in the ass due to safety regulatory issues (drone delivery, passenger flight), or just bad ideas overall (consumer camera that flies around and tries to follow you). There are occasionally bursts of genius in the field though. A few years ago I met a guy (Sergei at Fotokite, I believe), who was developing a tethered drone for photojournalism. Solves many problems at once: you don't run out of battery, you could control the drone via a stick or just pulling it around by the tether, people don't hate the drones as much when they can see the operator. He demonstrated it by deploying it in the reception area of an office building, probably 15x15ft. Now apparently they're developing a tethered drone for first responders that automatically deploys and gives you a 150' vantage point for situational awareness. BTW: No relation to Sergei or Fotokite, just impressed with their tech.

jcims 7y ago
I need one for point to point internet link to my home out in the boonies. 10M/768k DSL isn't cutting it any more.
- dehrmann 7y ago
  10Mbps DSL means you're two miles from a central office. For $20,000 per mile (maybe less?), you can get fiber run to your house. A friend actually did this.
  - semi-extrinsic 7y ago
    Ubiquiti sells you a pair of AirFibre gigabit microwave links for $3000. I'm sure you can rent a little tower space with fiber internet for a very long time for $36k.
    - jcims 7y ago
      This is the way i will go if i do anything. Got a quote of $9k for an 80’ freestanding tower to get over the tree canopy where i live. Then it’s just hardware costs plus probably $500/mo for gig internet plus antenna placement in town. I could easily sell 100M to 4-5 neighbors for $100/mo.

acollins1331 7y ago

Drones are huge in my department at school for collecting data with lidars and multispectral cameras. New drone techs for VC firms to invest in are going to need better technology, but a huge rollout of drones being used by everyday companies to do this is still in it's infancy. It's a good time to be someone graduating with experience with UAVs.

nomel 7y ago
> for collecting data with lidars and multispectral cameras What's the use case for this data?
- acollins1331 7y ago
  The numbers of uses are too large to count. I'll give one example: The DOT in my state has given large grants to use lidar from UAVs to be able to automatically identify wetlands.

heyflyguy 7y ago

Much of the drone industry circa 2009 - 2013 suffered from the exact same symptoms...develop awesome tech and then find a use case. I know of 3 that ran out of money before finding a way to even make money. sad but great lessons for anyone involved.

breck 7y ago

I was very excited about drones until https://www.boringcompany.com/ https://www.boringcompany.com/ came out. Moving things underground makes 1000x more sense.

lacker 7y ago

DJI is still valued at around $15 billion, right? To me it seems less like a drone bubble burst, and more like a single winner has emerged from round one.

RRRA 7y ago
They just got into FPV and I really hope they fail with their lock-in DRM, for the sake of keeping the maker spirit and FOSS innovation around in that field...
- gear54rus 7y ago
  Anything to read on that DRM? Google doesn't give much.
  - mlevental 7y ago
    they used to have an open platform so you could bring your own flight controller. the most recent gen of their platforms locks you into their flight controllers (and their shitty api).
    - ahartmetz 7y ago
      Heh. I have seen someone doing incredible maneuvers with crazy accelerations using a homebuilt drone. Compared to commercially available drones it's like an F1 car versus a tractor.
bdcravens 7y ago
I think the drone industry is to a drone producer what the cloud is to hard drive manufacturers. Many of the startups were creating value adds atop DJI.

_bxg1 7y ago

> Unmanned aircraft are still seen as a pillar of the future. But for now, all that over-heated enthusiasm is getting a cold blast of reality. Just waiting for the same to happen with AI.

streetcat1 7y ago
AI is hyped from the fifties. It might be the real thing today.
- _bxg1 7y ago
  It was hyped in the 80s, and real advances were made, and then it crashed. Now it's hyped again, and real advances are being made, but it's still set to crash again. The problem is that "AI" is too big and romanticized a term. Symbolic reasoning is a real technology; neural nets are a real technology; AI is at best science fiction, at worst marketing fluff. So despite having some real substance, the hype still outpaces the reality.
  - streetcat1 7y ago
    How is it set to fail again. Previous times the hardware was not there, now it is.

ingenieroariel 7y ago

Interesting that they did not mention 3DR. https://3dr.com/ https://3dr.com/ They went from selling the hobby 3DR Solo (which I own and love) to focusing entirely on the government side.

appleshore 7y ago

Zipline raised a $190m at a $1.2b valuation. Someone who seems credible (works for the government) told me their business model was questionable.

emcq 7y ago

The folks at Skydio are building something different. It's the first autonomous thing (car, boat, plane, drone, etc) that's widely available to consumers. They're releasing a new product soon and if it's better than what they had before DJI or anyone else won't be remotely close to having a similar product. Maybe a lot of the weaker companies have folded, hardware is hard, but would be very sad to see the innovation happening there collapse at this point.

blt 7y ago
Skydio has really good tech, if anything I guess they need to figure out how to get the price down.

ChuckMcM 7y ago

This is a typical startup contraction. Remember when the "PC bubble burst" and dozens of companies went bust, all with similar but slightly different business plans. It turned out that being able to execute efficiently was the winning strategy, not features, not fancy graphics, not custom cases. Just ruthless efficiency. A couple of years ago I went to UAV expo in Las Vegas and even then it was clear that a lot of drone companies were technology looking for a use case. And there were demonstrations of drones that did things much better (like mapping a traffic accident scene) than existing technology that saved both time and got the highways re-opened faster. Racing them with PoV cameras continues to be a lot of fun, it just isn't the multi-billion dollar sport yet, give it time.

TheSoftwareGuy 7y ago
People always seem to underestimate the power of boring efficiency
dehrmann 7y ago
> technology looking for a use case Did someone say blockchain?
- faissaloo 7y ago
  Blockchain already has a usecase: currency That's it, it's that simple
  - Cthulhu_ 7y ago
    Except that that's already failed; it's used as an investment product, a get-rich-quick scheme, dealing in illegal products and services, untraceable exchange of currency (e.g. ransomware) and money laundering. Nobody pays with crypto. Except people that made a lot of money off of crypto and have a vested interest in its success.
    - kirsebaer 7y ago
      Illegal products is an enormous market.

droithomme 7y ago

The FAA's licensing requirements for even toy craft killed this sector. Good news though, it's going incredibly strong overseas such as in Yemen where they've bought Chinese made drones and rapidly upgraded them into a domestic high tech military drone manufacturing capability... with 1000 mile ranges and bomb carrying capability. So drone fans might not be able to do their thing in the US, and the US might thus not have anyone locally that has a passion for drones, or is able to advance US drone technology, but the tech advances ... elsewhere.

itsyaboi 7y ago
Do you have any links that talk about this in more detail? Modifying a off-the-shelf drone (assuming you mean quad copter here, not a fixed wing craft) to have a 1000 mile range seems like quite the feat...

benboughton1 7y ago

I traveled to the US in 2014 on a sponsored trip to research drones for agriculture. My report covered off on some of the technical challenges rather than the business side of it. You could see even in 2014 everyone had great ideas but profitable execution was going to be so hard. My report is here for a look back in time http://www.nuffieldinternational.org/rep_pdf/1438074605BenBoughtonNuffieldReport_Final.pdf http://www.nuffieldinternational.org/rep_pdf/1438074605BenBo... . I then went on to start a business processing and providing satellite imagery in agriculture because I couldn't figure out a business model that would work for drones.

Fr0styMatt88 7y ago

I have a first-gen Parrot AR.Drone collecting dust. Great fun initially until I started reading about flyaways and then got too worried to actually fly the thing outside. Even nowadays I get the impression this issue was never solved. At the time it seemed like one of those widely-reported but never admitted-to things. I never understood why the software wouldn't just go into a fixed landing routine if the control signal was lost or if a watchdog tripped. Still really curious about that actually, if anyone here knows more technical details. So yeah that and the battery was never good enough. Now I look at drones and it seems like you have either really really cheap, subpar options or incredibly expensive DJI-quality drones. Something that costs around $300.00 AUD and that could fly for half an hour at a time would be a great toy, but I get that the tech isn't there. So I end up feeling like they're great tech that's ultimately killed by a thousand little tradeoffs. At least for me; if I was into video then one would be great for some things. That's a limited market in the end though, I think.

closetohome 7y ago
Man, I haven't heard of a flyaway in years. I always assumed it was just pilot error that the pilot blamed on the drone. Certainly saw enough of those situations that it's more believable than a phantom software issue.

malicioususer11 7y ago

literally: the fault of the EPA. Not Joking.

vsgzusnex 7y ago

My guess is fully autonomous drone products will prevail. The capabilities today are already incredible and the mobility lends itself to generalize to solutions that weren't previously possible. They could be one of the first kind of robotic agents that we regularly interact with in our lives besides automobiles. Skydio - https://www.theverge.com/2018/4/5/17195622/skydio-r1-review-autonomous-drone-ai-autopilot-dji-competitor https://www.theverge.com/2018/4/5/17195622/skydio-r1-review-... Shield AI - https://www.shield.ai/nova https://www.shield.ai/nova Battery life is certainly an issue but even before a major breakthrough happens 10-20 minutes is a long enough flight time for a lot of autonomous tasks. Plus what if they dock and charge themselves? I think they're going to continue getting smaller, more power efficient, and cheaper and it will continue to open up possibilities.

Qu3tzal 7y ago

ACSL (acsl.co.jp) is the first drone-making startup to enter Tokyo's exchange. They seem to have clients and are making money. They do B2B drones though, maybe this article was too focused on B2C companies.

buboard 7y ago

People talk a lot about the tech bubble and forget the VC bubble

carc1n0gen 7y ago

It kept getting harder and harder for me to legally use my drone. I own a parrot drone that weighs 500g. That uses to be the upper limit to not need an aviation license or certificate of some kind, and Insurance. Now 250g and up have those requirements, so I just stopped using it. I only used it once every few months for some arial footage anyway.

zelly 7y ago

Next is deep learning.