In a major milestone for Indian drone startup Aarav Unmanned Systems, the country’s aviation watchdog — DGCA — has certified the startup’s enterprise grade small category multicopter drone ‘Insight’ with an NPNT certification. The NPNT (No-Permission No-Takeoff) certification also makes the drone compliant to the manufacturing requirement laid down by the authority in its recently released Civil Aviation Requirement (CAR) for drone operations in India.
Vipul Singh, CEO, AUS said, “So far, we have been able to achieve 250% YoY growth from our end to end solution for enterprises. We are very optimistic about achieving at least 400% YoY growth and to help larger number of enterprises adopt compliant drone operations for their different business functions.”
DGCA’s categorisation enlists drones between 250gms to 2 kgs under micro category and drones in the 2-25 kgs weight under the small drones category. There are three Indian startups who have attained the micro certification. However, AUS is the only company to get certification under the small category.
The Insight PPK from AUS is a multicopter, enterprise grade drone. It has a maximum flight time of 30 minutes and an operational range of close to 3 kms. Regulatory compliance becomes necessary since the drone, in its 3 Kms range, could become out of sight. The drone weighs 3.5 kgs and has a wind resilience of 10m/sec. That basically means the wind-speed upto which the drone could continue to work as per directions from its drone pilot using its onboard sensors.
Small drone capabilities are much higher than the Micro drones as indicated by the increase in their payload size and weight. These often have higher quality sensors on board and larger payloads, which are in line with what businesses and industries working with drones seek, AUS said.
Aarav Unmanned Systems counts some of India’s biggest industrial conglomerates as its clients, including the likes of Adani, Aditya Birla Group, JSW steel among others.
