Flyability – Robohub https://robohub.org Connecting the robotics community to the world Mon, 05 Oct 2026 00:51:54 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=7.1.3 Into the heart of a glacier — with a drone https://robohub.org/into-the-heart-of-a-glacier-with-a-drone/ Wed, 20 Jan 2016 15:16:58 +0000 http://robohub.org/into-the-heart-of-a-glacier-with-a-drone/ Photo credit: Pierre-Yves Guernier

Photo credit: Pierre-Yves Guernier

With their near-vertical walls and deep fractures, glacier crevasses are dangerously narrow ice caves that present a huge risk to search and rescue teams. In a partnership between Flyability (Winner of the 2015 UAE Drones for Good Award) and the Zermatt Glacier mountain rescue team, drones were used to explore a remote crevasse in the Swiss Alps. The goal is to one day use the drones to help locate injured parties before dispatching a rescue team into dangerous territory, and also to help refine rescue techniques related to crevasse fall emergencies.

Photo credit: Pierre-Yves Guernier

Photo credit: Pierre-Yves Guernier

Until now, crevasses have been largely inaccessible (both to people and to robotic technologies) because their uneven narrow walls make them extremely difficult to navigate. The Flyability drone, however, turned this to advantage by using its spherical, freely rotating protective cage — called a gimbal — to bump its way safely down into the crevasse and back up to the surface, capturing a rare view of the landscape along the way. The embedded full HD camera, digital live video transmission, and powerful lighting system allowed the drone to operate in the heart of the mountain glacier, tens of meters below the surface.

The gimbal also makes the drone safe to fly close to humans, even while being remotely operated by an untrained pilot — another feature of critical importance in search and rescue operations.

Flyability SA develops collision-resistant drones for the inspection and exploration of inaccessible and confined environments such as those found in industrial inspection and search and rescue scenarios, in order to quickly and cost effectively provide crucial image and thermal information needed to locate damage or victims.

Photo credit: Pierre-Yves Guernier

Photo credit: Pierre-Yves Guernier

Photo credit: Pierre-Yves Guernier

Photo credit: Pierre-Yves Guernier

Photo credit: Pierre-Yves Guernie

Photo credit: Pierre-Yves Guernier

Photo credit: Pierre-Yves Guernie

Photo credit: Pierre-Yves Guernier

]]> Courtship of the drone fireflies: A short movie with flying robots and lights https://robohub.org/courtship-of-the-drone-fireflies-a-short-movie-with-flying-robots-and-lights/ Thu, 08 Oct 2015 14:14:36 +0000 http://robohub.org/courtship-of-the-drone-fireflies-a-short-movie-with-flying-robots-and-lights/ Flyability_Drone-CourtshipDrones, lights and nature combine in Drone Courtship, a short movie about a magical encounter between two flying robots set in a forest of centennial trees. A collaboration between Atelier D. Schlaepfer and Flyability, and filmed without special effects, the movie shows how robots can transform onscreen into living creatures.

The video features two drones zig-zagging in the forest, bumping into trees and rolling around leafy branches. Each drone is equipped with 6 meters (20 feet) of neon wire, two dozen of RGB LEDs and fluorescent material. The drones’ trajectories are remote-controlled by operators, while the lights execute a pre-programmed sequence and use data from onboard accelerometers to react in sync to contacts and collisions. The drones’ cages are freely rotating, which adds to the magic of the unique choreographies that are possible with this system.

The movie was shot in one summer night, and required several takes in order for the pilots and camera operators to synchronize their motions. The movie reminds us of fireflies at night, or perhaps of birds-of-paradise courtships that involve dance, color and amazing choreographies.

One of the goals of the video was to demonstrate how drones can be used for art and entertainment; the GimBall platform allows drones to safely and smoothly interacti with objects or humans, which really contributes to bringing them alive.

 

Atelier D. Schlaepfer’s undertakings are at the crossroads of art and design. They take place in variable settings such as public buildings, private homes, and urban or natural settings. Atelier D. Schlaepfer regularly collaborates with architects and construction specialists to offer a scenography of space in the form of lighting, coloring, or a formal concept.

The drones are manufactured by Flyability SA, a swiss company specializing in collision-resistant drones for industrial inspection. Flyability’s patent-pending technology is based on a freely rotating spherical protective cage, which allows drones to remain perfectly stable after contacts. They can thus access hard-to-reach places while being remotely operated. Equipped with a full HD camera, they can efficiently carry out close-up visual inspection of various structures or confined places, such as bridges, factories, boiler rooms, tanks, etc.

The two drones are each equipped with 6 meters (20 feet) of neon wire and 24 RGB LEDs.

The two drones are each equipped with 6 meters (20 feet) of neon wire and 24 RGB LEDs.

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]]> February was another good month for robotic investments https://robohub.org/february-was-another-good-month-for-robotic-investments/ Sat, 28 Feb 2015 16:20:00 +0000 http://robohub.org/february-was-another-good-month-for-robotic-investments/

February was another big month for investments in robotic startup companies. 3D Robotics, Flyability, Fetch Robotics, EHang and many others.

Equity and crowd fundings:

  • 3D Robotics raised $50M in a Series C round bringing total investment to date of $85M. Qualcomm was the principle investor in this round and 3DR intends to use the funds to expand R&D and begin using Snapdragon processors and Qualcomm sensors.
     
  • Fetch Robotics gets $3M to bring their new mobile manipulator to market and to hire up to 10 positions in addition to their present 10-member team. Fetch intends to display a research edition of their new robot at ICRA in May in Seattle.
     
  • RoboCV, a Russian startup and developer of a range of autopilot vehicle products, got $3 to scale up activities for robotizing mobile vehicles (forklifts, warehouse and mine tugs and tows) with vision, navigation and collision avoidance systems.
     
  • Flyability wins $1M award in a UAE-sponsored contest entitled 'Drones for Good.' The same organization has set up a new contest: 'Robotics for Good.' The goal is to encourage robotics innovation that benefits society in the areas of education, healthcare and social services. Two prizes will be given: a national prize worth 1M AED, and an international prize worth $1M USD.
     
  • Ehang Ghost Drone gets $10M funding and $857,851 from IndieGoGo. The $10M Series A round actually happened on December 30, 2014 but it wasn't widely publicized. They also received $858k from their IndieGoGo campaign which concluded mid January.
     
  • Sight Machine raised $5M to help manufacturers use advanced technology to get a handle on their data, particularly small datasets which are generally characterized as data describing what tracked objects are doing, e.g.: does the soil have the right mixture of nutrients or what is that mobile robot seeing?
  • Somabar got $312,717 from a Kickstarter campaign for their stylish wifi-enabled cocktail maker and app.
     
  • iCamPRO got $250,000 from an IndieGoGo campaign for their omnidirectional security camera with motion detectivation and follow capability. iCamPRO is a brand of Amaryllo Intl, an Amsterdam-based Dutch consumer and security products provider.

Not really an equity funding, but a fund for equity investing, Bolt, a Boston-based hardware accellerator and venture capital firm, completed funding of an investment fund of $25M to enable investing in new ventures bringing complex connected hardware products to market, some of which are robotic. Bolt established a new San Francisco facility (they share with Autodesk Pier 9 Workshop) and plan to to focus on SV startups and invest up to $500k per startup.

Acquisitions:

Perceptron continues its acquisition spree by purchasing Coord 3 for approximately $15 million. Coord 3 is an Italian provider of metrology equipment and has a line of measurement robots. Perceptron develops, produces, and sells 3D machine vision solutions for measurement, inspection, and robot guidance in industrial applications.

Failures:

And finally, Intuitive Automata and their little diet robot Autom ran out of money and failed. CEO and founder Cory Kidd has moved on to another San Francisco-based startup: Catalia Health.

Read more

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February was another big month for investments in robotic startup companies, including 3D Robotics, Flyability, Fetch Robotics, EHang and many others.

Equity and crowd fundings:

  • 3D Robotics raised $50M in a Series C round bringing total investment to date of $85M. Qualcomm was the principle investor in this round and 3DR intends to use the funds to expand R&D and begin using Snapdragon processors and Qualcomm sensors.
  • Fetch Robotics gets $3M to bring their new mobile manipulator to market and to hire up to 10 positions in addition to their present 10-member team. Fetch intends to display a research edition of their new robot at ICRA in May in Seattle.
  • RoboCV, a Russian startup and developer of a range of autopilot vehicle products, got $3 to scale up activities for robotizing mobile vehicles (forklifts, warehouse and mine tugs and tows) with vision, navigation and collision avoidance systems.
  • Flyability wins $1M award in a UAE-sponsored contest entitled ‘Drones for Good.’ The same organization has set up a new contest: ‘Robotics for Good.’ The goal is to encourage robotics innovation that benefits society in the areas of education, healthcare and social services. Two prizes will be given: a national prize worth 1M AED, and an international prize worth $1M USD.
  • Ehang Ghost Drone gets $10M funding and $857,851 from IndieGoGo. The $10M Series A round actually happened on December 30, 2014 but it wasn’t widely publicized. They also received $858k from their IndieGoGo campaign, which concluded mid January.
  • Sight Machine raised $5M to help manufacturers use advanced technology to get a handle on their data, particularly small datasets which are generally characterized as data describing what tracked objects are doing, e.g.: does the soil have the right mixture of nutrients or what is that mobile robot seeing?
  • Somabar got $312,717 from a Kickstarter campaign for their stylish wifi-enabled cocktail maker and app.
  • iCamPRO got $250,000 from an IndieGoGo campaign for their omnidirectional security camera with motion detectivation and follow capability. iCamPRO is a brand of Amaryllo Intl, an Amsterdam-based Dutch consumer and security products provider.

Not really an equity funding, but a fund for equity investing, Bolt, a Boston-based hardware accellerator and venture capital firm, completed funding of an investment fund of $25M to enable investing in new ventures bringing complex connected hardware products to market, some of which are robotic. Bolt established a new San Francisco facility (they share with Autodesk Pier 9 Workshop) and plan to to focus on SV startups and invest up to $500k per startup.

Acquisitions:

Perceptron continues its acquisition spree by purchasing Coord 3 for approximately $15 million. Coord 3 is an Italian provider of metrology equipment and has a line of measurement robots. Perceptron develops, produces, and sells 3D machine vision solutions for measurement, inspection, and robot guidance in industrial applications.

Failures:

And finally, Intuitive Automata and their little diet robot Autom ran out of money and failed. CEO and founder Cory Kidd has moved on to another San Francisco-based startup: Catalia Health.

]]> Flyability wins $1M Drones for Good competition https://robohub.org/flyability-wins-1m-drones-for-good-competition/ Tue, 10 Feb 2015 16:57:07 +0000 http://robohub.org/flyability-wins-1m-drones-for-good-competition/

Flyability, a spin off company from LIS, EPFL and NCCR Robotics, has won the $1M inaugural UAE Drones for Good competition with Gimball, the world’s first crash resilient drone.

Flyabiliy_Gimball_Adrien_Briod

The award was initiated by Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice-President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai with the aim of “transforming these exciting technologies into practical solutions for improving people’s lives today”.  Referred to by some as “the World Cup of Drones”, the competition involved the 39 semi finalists showcasing their technology in front of a panel of international judges. Flyability impressed observers with its ability to fly in disaster tight and cluttered disaster zones, outside a pilot’s direct line of sight. Also noted was the Gimball’s unique design, which actively invites collisions rather than trying to avoid them. Its rotating gimbal system and protective wire cage not only keep the drone safe from crashes, but also protect humans working in close proximity to the device. The team was awarded $1M USD in prize money.

Flyability SA is one year old and its founders, Adrien Briod and Patrick Thévoz, are working to bring the Gimball to market. Their first aim is to use it for industrial inspection and to locate victims after natural disasters, but they plan to tackle the security and entertainment markets at some point too.

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