Infrastructure for unmanned aerial vehicles in Russia
Drones are called one of the markets of the future. But for their full and comprehensive use, the appropriate infrastructure is needed. This article tells about the state of infrastructure in Russia in 2020-2021. and the prospects for its development.
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Drones are the foundation of the logistics of the future. They talk about this a lot and for a long time, but years go by, and the prospects for mass exploitation remain vague. But by 2021, only isolated projects could be observed so far. For example, near Las Vegas, they have been trying to launch an experimental drone port for several years, and in Rwanda, the American company Zipline has established the delivery of medical supplies to remote areas. Russian enthusiasts also do not sleep: in Russia there are companies that use and produce copters and landing sites and sell their services for export. These include UVL Robotics, Copter Express and Geoscan.
Estimates of the volume of the future high-tech market are seriously different. The builders of the American drone port announced that they are counting on the growth of the market for the unmanned systems industry between 2015-2025 to more than $80 billion. Experts of the Russian project DronesHub hope that by 2024 this market will amount to $6 billion in Russia and up to $43 billion in the world. UVL Robotics cautiously believes that the potential of the global logistics drone market (in terms of delivery of parcels, medicines, etc.) will be about $28 billion by 2027.
No one doubts drones are the market of the future. However, for their full and comprehensive use, a global infrastructure is needed. What prevents it from being created? Maybe opponents of the new technology? Those who now shout that drones interfere with the movement of helicopters and load airspace, that they often suffer a catastrophe, which threatens the life and health of people? What will be done in this sector in the next 10 years? Experts from industry companies answered these questions to TAdviser.
Changing helicopters to air taxi
There is no infrastructure for urban use of aerial drones now anywhere - neither in Russia nor in other countries. Despite the fact that the initial elements are already beginning to appear, the first full-fledged deployments can be seen no earlier than 2025, says Oleg Ponfilenok, general director of Copter Express. In his opinion, first they will be created in the most technologically developed megacities. The economic effectiveness of the new technology must be proven, and only then it will begin to be built everywhere.
Oleg Ponfilenok divides the infrastructure for drones into two sectors. The first is for air taxis or any other transportation of people (as an option, dimensional and heavy cargo) by air. The second is for the delivery of lightweight cargo and monitoring using compact quadcopters or tiltrotors. These two types require a different approach to infrastructure.
The infrastructure for air taxis based on unmanned aerial vehicles with vertical take-off and landing is an analogue of helicopter. The only difference is that the helicopter always requires refueling only with fuel, and the drone sometimes with electricity. This is confirmed by the project of the Ural Civil Aviation Plant (UZGA). Representatives of the UZGA stated that they plan to develop and use drones capable of landing on the helipad of a remote settlement, where it can be met and unloaded by a mail officer.
Developed helicopter infrastructure today can be found not only in remote areas, but also in large cities, where there are already sites on the roofs, in Singapore, Hong Kong, New York. In terms of dimensions, an unmanned taxi will not differ from a small helicopter, so the existing landing pads are perfect for this. It is on this base that air taxi will be created in the first place.
Roy of parcels
As for compact drones for delivery and monitoring, everything will have to be created from scratch. Small drone sites have a standard "meter per meter" size. At most, they need an outlet or even a solar panel. You can put on the street: on public transport stops, on vending machines, on postomats, on the roofs of houses, and not necessarily flat. Prices for such turnkey sites start at several thousand dollars apiece.
Why have they not yet been created in the right quantity in Russia? Because there is no successful international case, says Oleg Ponfilenok. He believes that Russian investors already have enough risks associated with geopolitics, and they are unlikely to want to add another risk to them - to invest in a solution that has not yet been piloted in the world.
Meanwhile, such a pilot is preparing. The founder of UVL Robotics, Yevgeny Grankin, said that his company is implementing a similar project for the Gulf countries. In particular, as of the end of 2020, they are working on a pilot in Oman. In 2021, the first 20 units will be installed in the capital of the Muscat Sultanate.
The postamate is combined with the landing pad, and here the process of replacing the battery with a robot-manipulator takes place. UVL Robotics developed this element of infrastructure with the involvement of European partners.
 | It makes no sense for a startup to do everything on its own, especially when there are already ready-made solutions on the market. It is more correct to act as an aggregator for customized know-how. In the final - in three years of a pilot project for Oman - 1,000 units will be delivered that will close most of the country, says Evgeny Grankin. |  |
What should ideally be?
What should the global infrastructure ideally be?
| | A full-fledged infrastructure should be understood as a system of five components: an unsegregated airspace, a flight safety control system, ground infrastructure (airfields, refueling points, emergency landing, cargo transfer), allocated radio frequencies and a regulatory framework that would regulate unmanned aircraft at the legislative level, says Andrey Grudev, deputy general director of Geoskan. | |
According to Yevgeny Grankin, the infrastructure of the future is, first of all, a completely autonomous system, without human participation. Autonomy should permeate all processes from loading a parcel into a drone to obtaining insurance and permission to fly. All processes need to be automated.
At the same time, the main problem, according to the founder of UVL Robotics, is not the replacement of batteries with a robot and other technical processes, but the automatic administration of flights. In Russia, you can wait for permission for several days, he notes, and the delivery industry is used to a different mode of operation: if the client ordered today, it is necessary to deliver today.
| | Our partner in the sultanate is directly linked to the Oman Ministry of Industry and Trade. Therefore, to resolve the issue of prompt issuance of permits for drone flights, a whole working group was created with representatives of departments engaged in flight control. As a result, we are now negotiating all issues. The participation of Oman mail also helps. To dispatch flights to UVL Robotics, they decided to use AirMap - a global international map for drones, which already has all the necessary certificates, - said the founder of UVL Robotics. | |
Safety
There are enough skeptics in the world who are ready to ban drone flights because of their danger. The main problem, they believe, is the risk of collisions, falls and loss of cargo. International companies are actively lobbying for amendments to the legislation of their countries regarding the use of UAVs. However, amendments are introduced for individual corporations. Lawmakers so far fear that the massive distribution of drones threatens uncontrolled consequences, and this is not without grounds.
| | Relatively recently, a UAV accounting system weighing up to 30 kg has been launched in Russia. It is formally mandatory, but in fact about 25 thousand are listed in the register. UAVS. Hundreds of thousands of drones were sold, that is, hardly a tenth was officially registered: in the first 6 months of 2020, Russians acquired 95 thousand drones, Andrei Grudev, deputy general director of Geoskan, cited data. - Unaccounted for drones pose a problem, including in terms of prosecution in the event of damage to third parties. In addition, at the moment, even the possibility of insurance of UAV flights is limited. And no company undertakes to insure the drones themselves or the cargo transported by them for reasonable money. | |
Copter manufacturers themselves are so far distracted from global issues and immersed in specific passive and active safety tasks. The issue with a passive safety system is solved using a parachute. If the engine fails, the drone lands gently and without consequences. As for the active security system, it is implemented using radar, which makes it possible to recognize an obstacle and avoid a collision. These two systems, for example, will be used in the Omani UVL Robotics case.
There is a point of view that it is necessary to ensure that the operator is able to take control of the drone at any time.
| | If you build such a system on the basis of 4G networks, then you can implement only basic functions, for example, the "carpet" command (landing), - says Oleg Ponfilenok, general director of Copter Express, - A software product based on 5G will give much more opportunities. This is already a video connection and full remote control. | |
So far, the external pilot does not interact with the airspace control system, and drone flights are not controlled by dispatchers, notes Andrei Grudev. The pilot also does not have the legal ability to interact with the board via a radio channel at any significant distance - in Russia there is no frequency range allocated that unmanned aircraft could use, he added.
What will happen in the next 10 years?
Infrastructure in Russia will be created in any case. All experts are sure of this. This will be done at least in order to facilitate the titanic efforts of the Russian Post to deliver to regions where roads are bad - in Siberia, the Far East, and Buryatia. However, estimates of the implementation horizon of the new technology vary. According to Oleg Ponfilenok, the scaling of international experience will begin with us no earlier than 2030. Evgeny Grankin believes that if desired, market participants, together with government officials within the framework of the working group, will be able to solve the main problematic issues in three years. This also applies to the automatic receipt of flight permits and liability insurance.
As for the cost of infrastructure of the future, it can be several tens of millions of dollars for a country like Oman. In Russia, according to Andrei Grudev, the price will be within several hundred billion rubles. To invest such money, you need to be sure of the economic effect.
According to Yevgeny Grankin, the cost of drone delivery does not win in price with regular delivery, but there is another significant plus, which ultimately gives the desired economic effect, this is the delivery speed. As UVL Robotics experiments have shown, in the city this figure for a drone is three times higher. And in conditions where roads are mountain serpentines, the difference in speed increases to ten or more times.
| | The creation of infrastructure will contribute to the development of various areas - from unmanned delivery of goods to entertainment. It will definitely create new jobs and bring growth to the economy. Today, about 95% of income in the field of unmanned aviation falls on monitoring and remote sensing of the ground, as well as on drone shows, says Andrei Grudev. | |
And according to Oleg Ponfilenka, the main effect of the widespread introduction of infrastructure for unmanned aerial vehicles is not so much profit as a new quality of life and a gain in reducing investments in road construction and repair.
| | If we talk about the global introduction of air taxi, this will help solve the problem with roads. It will no longer be necessary to build them, - Oleg Ponfilenok is sure. - This is the only way to restore our ecosystem, since the planet can no longer cope with the current level of urbanization. Deurbanization is necessary. If you can cover 100 kilometers from home by air taxi in forty minutes, you can live where you like and in complete harmony with nature. It will change development, architecture, land value and even people's habits. | |
What do startups do?
Current market players remain optimistic about the development of the new industry. As for startups that are still creating know-how for the infrastructure of the future, they are actively looking for investors and do not miss the opportunity to introduce their technologies on the basis of large companies. One of the sites where startups related to UAV logistics present their solutions is the Moscow Innovation Cluster, a project of the Moscow government.
| | The cluster regularly holds technological contests on a free basis, where projects are collected from all over the country, and recently from abroad: France, Latvia, Israel, Kazakhstan. We help startups to competently pack their solutions and pilot them on the basis of large Russian companies or city structures. This year we are seeing a sharp increase in high-tech projects, "said Anatoly Valetov, head of the Moscow Innovation Cluster. | |
The future is being created today. Tomorrow the market will already be occupied by major players. Companies that want to get construction involved in drone infrastructure need to do that right now. Whoever comes into the game earlier will benefit a lot.
Author: Dmitry Leontyev
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