Drones ahoy!

The micro-drone is an idea whose time has come. We are not talking about the big military unmanned vehicle with a   bomb in the nose that  some governments  have been deploying to take out their enemies on foreign soil. 

No, the biggest personal technology of idea in 2015, will likely be  a small  rubber-and-plastic contraption, weighing less than 1 kg,  the size of a large pizza. It is more accurately called a quadcopter because it is lifted and propelled by  four rotors,  two of them spinning one way and two the other.   Vary the  speed of  the rotors and you  can control how the  drone pitches, yaws, climbs, descends or zooms.

The beauty of this new class of drone is that the personal controlling it is YOU , working with a smartphone or tablet. Like all compelling personal technologies, the micro drone won’t go away just because governments  worldwide are  worried about  what drones in public hands can do. We first heard of personal drones about a year ago when  they were tried out worldwide, to deliver pizzas.  In May last year, Francesco's Pizzeria, in  Mumbai's Lower Parel area,  did a test delivery  to  the 21st floor terrace of an apartment in Worli about 1 1/2 kms away.  

The police made threatening noises, so the idea never took off. As things stand, it is unlikely that in India, authorities will allow the use of drones in public spaces any time soon. The Director General of Civil Aviation took the easy option of banning drones altogether, presumably, till  government  figures out what is the legislation elsewhere.  In countries where some form of regulation is in place, recreational drones are generally permitted  if the  height flown  is less than 400  feet ( 120 metres)  and the range is within line of sight  or not more than half a kilometre. There are also restrictions if you strap a camera to the drone  (the most common use today): you can't breach other people's privacy or get closer than 30 metres to them.

In the absence of any regulation in India on use of drones in public space, it is  better to deploy drones within  one's private property and even this offers  a lot of interesting options: There is no difficulty in using drones indoors and at many weddings these days, it makes for more interesting video, if the camera is mounted on a drone rather than on a Jimmy Jib crane which costs around Rs 7000/ hour to hire.  

A drone with a gyro-stabilised fish eye lens and a full HD camera   can be had in India for around Rs 30,000.  Indeed, at the last three mobile phone launches I have attended, the handset was delivered to the VIP on the stage by a drone. These payload drones which can carry about 500 grams, cost  between Rs 10,000 - 15,000. Within gated communities or  large apartment complexes,  there should be no problem in operating drones within the private space and the labour-saving possibilities are endless. 

If a courier consignment or a pizza for that matter is handed over at the security gate of the complex, it can very well be flown to the balcony of a 10th floor apartment rather than  have a delivery person  walk a  a few hundred metres and take the elevator! I heard informally that some resort hotels in Goa are also toying with the idea of using drones to deliver a newspaper or housekeeping extras like tea bags or towel, to guests in distant  sea-facing cottages. 

And what about the campuses of  the big IT companies? The Microsoft campus in Gachibowli, Hyderabad is so vast, it can take 10 minutes to reach some departments from the main gate. Some of their staff who had visited the US  had brought  toy drone kits for their kids to assemble  and I heard some loud  talk about how easy it would be distribute mail daily via drone,  to each department.

Even a country with strict air space controls like China,  has permitted e-commerce giant Alibaba  to deliver  ginger tea  packets  to customers in some areas of Beijing and Shanghai, via drone.  Even three years ago, some academic campuses like the Free University of Berlin realised that drones were an unstoppable idea and permitted them on campus for food delivery, albeit in a controlled way.  In the world's vast out doors,  some breathtaking views of nature otherwise unobtainable, are being captured using camera-drones. Film makers will soon  make  a drone yet another platform for their  movie cameras.

Will the personal drone  will be as  common as the  personal phone or computer? Maybe not; but the possibilities are truly exciting.  And  as it happens with phones, your children will learn to use one creatively, before you do!  The  cheapest drones cost just Rs 3000 or so at Indian online shops so start playing!

While most drones offered  at Indian online sites are imported  that is slowly changing. Engineers at TechJeeva in Kerala's Startup Village   have built a series of drones since 2011, including an all-weather drone that can carry a payload of 2 kg for one hour.  They are trying to interest Amazon in their product.

One of the first Indian makers of drones is Delhi-based  Om UAV Systems, founded by two enginering grads from Punjuab. Their focus is on the  defence and police market, but their website also offers  a number of  micro drones in  kit form for   lay users,  controlled by a laptop or tablet and guided by Google Maps.

Bangalore -based Dynamatic Technologies is another desi drone maker  whose unmanned aerial vehicle, Patang is tailored for  professional  use -- aerial mapping and policing, agriculture surveys, disaster response.