In a successful trial that offers a breakthrough in urgent medical deliveries, units of blood have been flown by drones from one hospital to another 25km away using the industry leading ‘Halo’ technology developed by ASX-listed Elsight (ELS).
The drones were built by major Brazilian drone company Speedbird Aero, which uses the ‘Halo’ platform for the critical task of safely and reliably controlling its delivery drones Beyond the Visual Line of Sight (BVLOS).
The trial from Rambam Medical Center in Haifa to Galilee Medical Center in Nahariya, Israel, involved the transfer of 3.8 kilograms of blood, however the drone model used in the pilot run can carry up to 10 kilograms.
Elsight at forefront of drone delivery revolution
As well as Speedbird Aero, Elsight counts among its more than 80 global partners US company DroneUp, which supports Walmart’s expanding drone delivery service to 36 hubs across six states. The US retail giant has plans to reach 4 million homes with its drone deliveries this year.
Additionally, Elsight has a major commercial partnership with Spright, a subsidiary of privately-owned Air Methods Corporation, a leading provider of airborne medical services in North America.
Spright was created to help solve many of the toughest time sensitive challenges facing health services for communities across the US and is now revolutionising healthcare delivery with a model that could be easily adapted across Australia’s rural and remote communities. The company’s streamlined and environmentally sustainable drone-based deliveries overcome the challenges of inefficient road and/or crewed aircraft operations to hard-to-reach and often disadvantaged healthcare clients.
Regulations get up to speed with tech
In a demonstration of how regulations are now catching up with drone connectivity technology, Spright has earned the first of its kind US Federal Aviation Authority (FAA) beyond visual line of sight (BVLOS) waiver for drone operations.
The waiver was granted for drone operations involving critical utility infrastructure surveys, another use case with crucial relevance across Australia, particularly during or after natural disasters.
In Australia, which follows the US lead in aviation regulations, the Federal Department of Infrastructure granted the Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA) more discretion on drones in late 2021.
CASA has now started using this discretion to streamline approvals for applications including shark surveillance, natural disaster management, remote healthcare, and urban grocery and fast food delivery.
‘Halo’ Design Wins to save and change lives
Elsight CEO Yoav Amitai said it was an exciting time to be involved in the rapidly expanding drone delivery sector.
We’ve only started to see the life-changing, and in some cases life-saving, use cases for drones that can be enabled by regulations coming up to speed with connectivity technology,” Mr Amitai said. “Being part of a company that enabling those major improvements to everyday lives is a great feeling.
He said the company’s Design Win strategy provided in-built scalability so that as its clients grow with easing regulations, so too will Elsight’s repeat orders for the future-proofed Halo.
The platform already includes remote ID capability expected to be mandated by the FAA. It also allows one-to-many connection, which is when a remote operator can control numerous drones at the same time, which is expected to be the next disruptive event in the drone sector as soon as regulations allow remote operations at scale.
Importantly, Elsight offers real-time individual support for its customers across the world, as explained by Senior Vice President Commercial Business at Spright Justin Steinke.
“One of the things I like most about ‘Halo’ is the team of people who support it,” he says.
“The hardware and the software are really second to none. We’ve seen no other solution that has all the pieces and components that ‘Halo’ does. But each aircraft so far has been very different so being able to integrate this in a way that’s effective and in which the architecture makes sense is a very complex problem to solve.
“The Elsight team has been absolutely fantastic in making sure we have the right support needed to not only integrate ‘Halo’ in the aircraft, but if we ever have any issues or concerns, they’re right there to help us fix those in real time.”