Gradually tear off geek "toy" label drone commercial market heats up

The technology circle is now a hotspot, not a drone, whether it is "breaking into" the White House or helping Feng to propose the headlines, the drone exposure soared daily, the new era of "big Toys" business value is rapidly digging. Recently there have been rumors, millet company new investment in unmanned aircraft research and development team. Taobao and Yuantong United merchants last week in Beijing and other specific areas of the unmanned aircraft delivery services.

As in the area including aerial, express, security is gradually applied, the commercial value of the UAV is being excavated, the drone consumer market heating up also makes the unmanned aircraft manufacturing enterprises are favored by capital.

Gadgets, big production.

The drone was originally a "toy" for geeks (the Frontier technology enthusiasts), but a niche technology product. As the exposure increases, there are more and more discussions about the drone market. At the beginning of this year, 14 unmanned aircraft companies took part in the CES (the American International Consumer Electronics Fair), which led the global consumer-electronics wind, including the IT giants such as Intel.

U.S. Consumer Electronics Association data show that 2015 global civilian drones are expected to sell 400,000, the market size is forecast to increase 55%, to 130 million U.S. dollars in 2018, the global drone market is expected to grow at least 1 billion dollars. The market forecasts also show the value of this technology product and the future of the field.

Domestic also out of the expected UAV hardware manufacturing enterprises, including the great Xinjiang Innovation and Technology Co., Ltd. is the most representative, according to the Research Institute Frost & Sullivan Estimates, the Xinjiang occupied the global small UAV market share of 50%, The protagonist of the news, which has been the subject of recent discussions, has received more attention from the industry. The company was founded in 2007, sales from 2010 to more than 3 million yuan to 800 million yuan in 2013, is expected to be more than 3 times times in 2014 growth.

In addition, the recent domestic unmanned aircraft manufacturing enterprises are also favored by capital. Among them, extremely fly completes 20 million dollar a round financing, billion airlines also completed 10 million dollar a round financing. A few days ago also spread the big Xinjiang will accept Sequoia Capital 200 million yuan investment. With the financing, the valuations of these companies have also increased dozens of times times.

"Toys" meets policy thresholds

Drones are starting to spread, thanks to reduced manufacturing costs and improved technology. At present, consumer-level civilian drones at relatively cheap prices have also become a hobby for some enthusiasts.

One Xinjiang insider admits that the four-rotor aircraft is fun, but it is also being explored as a value industry outside of toys. In the transition from professional to consumer-level products, the biggest drag is from consumers ' perceptions, except for the important threshold of entry.

Hu Yichang, chief executive of Hai Aviation Technology Co., Ltd. explained that the popularity of civilian drones, which has emerged in recent 10 years, has been a large number of civilian drones with low-cost hardware and software and modular design as technical features. However, the cost and performance, reliability, security is difficult to reconcile the contradictions, civil aircraft still can not be compared with the traditional people with airworthiness certificate machine.

"Some of the aircraft-born UAV manufacturers have insufficient technical reserves, the airworthiness regulations of the people are also deficient, although efforts to improve product reliability, but the security of privacy risks remain." "Hu Yichang introduced that the policy requires the initial airworthiness of the UAV in accordance with the method of Chartered flight certificate management, need to register, the operating weight of more than 7 kilograms of the unmanned aircraft need to hold a driver's certificate, but February 9 data statistics show that the current number of unmanned aircraft holders a total of 244 people."

Many people believe that the consumer-level drone market is in dire need of policy guidance, and policy support will help it get rid of toy definitions and explore broader business models. Companies are hoping that the new technology will be used to achieve rapid realization. However, if the proper commercial scene cannot be found, it will discreetly.

Business Scene Extension

"There's a voice in the industry saying that drone business is just a gimmick, but in fact, the successful application of the scene is there," Hu Yichang that, aside from the regulatory level, technical aspects of the UAV is still flawed, but some applications such as aerial, aerial survey can bypass these shortcomings, enterprises choose the appropriate commercial scene development market can gain profit space.

Wang Yu, chief executive of Xinjiang, has said that manipulating flight models for aerial photography is a lucrative business, with almost every scene of a film being filmed. The great Xinjiang unmanned aerial vehicle in aerial photograph, aerial survey aspect performance also obtained the market recognition.

UAV is also a concern in the field of logistics and transportation. In fact, several big power companies such as Amazon, DHL and other international giants have begun to try UAV logistics, such as Amazon launched the Prime Air UAV Logistics plan, Google acquired the drone company Titan Aerospace, Germany approved the DHL unmanned aircraft delivery. Domestic aspects, Taobao, Yuantong, Shun Fung also joined the UAV logistics exploration ranks.

Hu Yichang said that the use of unmanned aircraft to carry out the transport of goods will be achieved, but at this stage is limited by costs, regulation also needs to improve. So it takes years to see the real application.

In addition, UAV can also be used in agricultural production, rescue, energy, wildlife conservation and other fields. Industry forecasts the future of civilian consumption in the field of unmanned aircraft will be more widely used, but still need technology, enterprise, policy and other aspects of the grinding.

Pure main business for civilian unmanned aircraft Enterprise, volume is not very large, it is easy to encounter development bottlenecks. The lack of effective barriers to competition and the threshold of the industry, creating profits is also difficult. UAV companies need to focus on the applicable business scenarios in order to allow product prices across the cost line.