DRONECONOMICS

MANUFACTURING, IT WILL NEED TO A GLOBAL HUB FOR DRONE AS INDIA LOOKS AT BECOMING ADDRESS CERTAIN CONCERNS TO ENSURE THE NASCENT INDUSTRY SOARS TO THE INTENDED HEIGHTS

- MANISH PANT

IT ISN’T A bird. It isn’t a plane. And no, it isn’t Superman either. Neither is it an alien object. What, then, is this flying machine that has everyone from bloggers to founders to scientists excited? It is a drone. Weighing between 20 gm and 100 kg, drones are touted as the next frontier in technology—along with IoT devices, AI and ML—there is a use-case for drones in practically every sector.

And naturally, business is beginning to boom. From just a handful of drone companies till a decade ago, India is today believed to have up to 250 such firms across manufacturing and services. “The indigenous drone manufacturing ecosystem has changed tremendously in the past few years,” says Neel Mehta, Director and Co-founder of Bengaluru-based full-stack drone tech firm Asteria Aerospace, a subsidiary of Reliance’s Jio Platforms. “By creating an enabling regulatory framework and policy, the government is encouraging manufacturers to enhance capabilities.” The introduction of the liberalised Drone Rules, 2021, paved the way for innovation throughout the sector. “As drone imports have been banned, there has been a surplus demand for Make in India drones in the country, leading to tremendous scope for growth in the manufacturing sector,” says Prateek Srivastava, Founder & MD of DroneAcharya Aerial Innovations, a Pune-based provider of drone and GIS technology courses and solutions.

However, he warns that domestic manufacturers need to come up to the level of quality set by global pioneers in the field so that they can meet the requirements of customers who were buying imported drones earlier. But make no mistake, quality levels are not the only mountains to be climbed. There are many more challenges the nascent industry faces, but more on that later.