Skip to main content

Report forecasts rapidly changing market for drones

A new IDTechEx report, Electric Drones: Unmanned Aerial Vehicles UAVs 2015-2025, examines the market for drones or unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), saying that most of the market value today lies in military applications, both for electric and - the big money - non-electric versions. Nonetheless, small UAVs are increasing in sales fastest and that is primarily down to non-military applications. From 2026, civil uses will greatly exceed military in market value. The report forecasts it all but concentrates o
February 19, 2015 Read time: 3 mins
RSSA new 6582 IDTechEx report, Electric Drones: Unmanned Aerial Vehicles UAVs 2015-2025, examines the market for drones or unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), saying that most of the market value today lies in military applications, both for electric and - the big money - non-electric versions. Nonetheless, small UAVs are increasing in sales fastest and that is primarily down to non-military applications. From 2026, civil uses will greatly exceed military in market value.

The report forecasts it all but concentrates on hybrid and pure electric versions because these are taking over.
 
Dr Harrop, chairman of IDTechEx says, "The biggest market sub-sector will be small UAVs that are not toys or personal, with US$2 billion in sales in 2025 generating over US$20 billion in benefits in agriculture, border protection, parcel delivery, logistics such as warehousing, coastguard, customs, search and rescue, medical emergency, malaria research, mine detection, protection of rare species, movie production and so on."
 
For example, Amazon recently reiterated that they are committed to delivering packages to customers via drones when they get the regulatory support needed. China's biggest internet retailer Alibaba trialled drone deliveries in the country at the beginning of February. 1691 Google has also been testing drone deliveries in Australia, and DHL carried out deliveries by unmanned aircraft in Germany.
 
According to the report, new applications appear every month and it particularly concentrates on what has happened in 2014-15 and what comes next in this changing market.  That includes technological change, with bodywork becoming electric and electronics to save cost, volume and weight while increasing reliability and life.
 
This 200 page report has over 120 figures and tables distilling the markets and technology into roadmaps and forecasts by number, unit value and market value 2015-2025. The rapidly changing powertrains, the uses, participants and benefits are discussed.
 
Adoption of cameras, cost reduction, types, alternatives, legal issues, latest news, new inventions from drones that walk or swim to ones proposed for garnering power - it is all here. Autonomy is addressed and the hype curve in the context of other relevant electric vehicles. Components and systems manufacturers will see the big picture with the full opportunity drone makers and users can benchmark.
 
Beyond the UAV powertrain, with its radically changing motors and so on, there are the telematics, sensor platforms and optics all changing rapidly to become far more functional and lighter in weight.
 
The report also explains laser powered drones and ones that are planned to do more than just regenerative soaring but even export electricity to earth. Of course, there can be no one size fits all for all this. Fixed wing, multi-copter and other configurations will all have a place.

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • AAA App provides step-by-step guidance following a traffic crash
    April 19, 2012
    AAA has launched the latest addition to its suite of free mobile applications with the release of the AAA Insurance app for iPhone and iPad that walks drivers through the post-traffic crash process of collecting information, photos, as well as providing one-touch access to call police and emergency services, AAA to request a tow, and the AAA Insurance claims department, for those AAA Insurance policyholders.
  • Personal Rapid Transit, clear benefits for European cities
    July 26, 2012
    David Crawford watches the race to get the world's first PRT system up and running. To paraphrase the old joke about buses bunching, you seem to have to wait several decades for a Personal Rapid Transit (PRT) system, and then half a dozen come along together. Currently, in fact, there are well over that number of schemes for driverless electric passenger-carrying 'pod' networks at various stages of planning, design and implementation around the world. Locations range from a straight-off-the-drawing board ne
  • BlackBerry’s Jeff Davis: ‘Hands off 5.9GHz!’
    September 25, 2019
    As a US Marine, BlackBerry’s Jeff Davis saw the world’s trouble spots. But much of his attention is now focused on what he sees as the ITS sector’s biggest issue: cybersecurity. Adam Hill finds out more Oh, I often feel I’m the dumbest guy in the room,” laughs Jeff Davis, senior director, connected transportation, at BlackBerry. It’s hard to credit this. Davis has a range of experience that sets him apart from most people in the ITS sector. He was in the US Marine Corps, with seven tours of duty, inclu
  • Flir takeover of Traficon and the role of thermal imaging
    February 28, 2013
    Andy Teich, president of commercial systems at Flir, discusses the growing role of thermal technology in ITS and his company’s latest high-profile acquisition with Jason Barnes. Andy Teich, Flir’s president of commercial systems, doesn’t want to talk about infrared (IR). Instead, he’d prefer, he says, to discuss ‘thermal technology’. It is, he explains, to differentiate between the imaging technologies which his company specialises in and the LED illumination of IR cameras, an altogether different beast. Fl