Every great football club has scouts to track down young talent. In the same way, Indra has gone into partnership with Business Factory Aero to select the most innovative SMEs and start-up companies specializing in the world of drones.

The Galician accelerator and incubator based in Lugo has already selected the first six with the help of technology and a group of partners. It has chosen them from among more than one hundred proposals received from companies and entrepreneurs based all over the world.

These projects have become part of the Civil UAVs Initiative, the most ambitious civil drone development project in Europe, with which the Galician Government is seeking to launch an international technological pole in the region. The initiative using this type of aircraft will also improve the services that the Administration provides to citizens.

Three of these “signings” have reached their initial stage of development. They are:

• GeneraDron: an integrated system based on laser technology to collect optical and thermographic data on moving wind turbines. The aim is to use drones to carry out the maintenance of the wind turbines without having to interrupt their operation.
• H2 Dron Energy Galicia: production of electrical energy by means of hydrogen fuel cells to power unmanned vehicles.

• Radio UAV. Beyond the visible applications: development of active sensors (radars) and passive sensors (antennas) to enable the drones to see everything happening in the ranges of the radio spectrum beyond the reach of the human eye. This project has been jointly submitted by the Universities of Vigo and Oviedo.

The other three projects have been chosen from among proposals with a greater degree of maturity. They already have an advanced prototype in some cases. The SMEs or start-up companies working on them have now reached the industrialization and marketing phases. They are:

• Lupeon: the engineering company of the same name is working on the optimization and manufacture of structural parts of UAVs with additive techniques. This kind of manufacturing reduces the weight of the structures and increases the drone’s flight autonomy.
• VTOL plane: UAV Works is developing a drone that can take off vertically like a helicopter and glide like a plane. The system increases its autonomy by up to five times compared with conventional multicopters.
• ADS-B Data-Analytics Platform: development of a data analysis platform, which will have advanced features based on ADS-B automatic aircraft detection and identification technology integrated into it.

“These are projects with very obvious commercial applications,” states David Pascual, director of Indraventures, the investment vehicle with which Indra drives its innovation model. “Above all, we appreciate the fact that the system is scalable and profitable and that it brings clear benefits to users in terms of cost reduction and increased security”, adds Pascual.

In the case of the first three projects in their “seed” phase, the role of BF Aero (https://www.bfaero.es/), Indra and the other partners involves shortening the timescales to ensure that these ideas become a reality.

In the case of the more mature projects, Indra provides its strategic business vision and its huge commercial capacity as a company operating in 140 countries with large customers in all the sectors of the economy. “Our role is to steer them and open up the gates of sectors we’ve been working in for decades; and in which we’re leaders in many cases”, states Javier Barcala, director of Aerial Vehicles at Indra.

However, all these projects only constitute the first step for BF Aero. There will be new ideas added to the existing ones in 2020 and 2021. The selection of the upcoming projects is beginning right now. The aim is to provide support and financing for 19 proposals.

Further information:
 

Civil UAVs Initiative: http://www.civiluavsinitiative.com/

BFAero: https://www.bfaero.es/