Techeagle, a drone delivery startup has collaborated with Indian Postal Department for a pilot project to deliver mail with the help of drone technology in Gujarat’s Kutch district. Techeagle has successfully delivered its first parcel via drone with 5X faster speed than surface transportation.
The drone covered a total aerial distance of 46 kms in less than 30 minutes. The project made a clear indication that India is ready to use drones for postal deliveries in the future.
The project was done using TechEagle’s Hybrid e-VTOL Drone Vertiplane X3 which is a vertical takeoff and landing drone that takes off and lands vertically like a helicopter from a small area of 5mX5m, and can cover a longer distance of up to 100 km at a top speed of up to 120 km/h.
Devusinh Chauhan, Minister of State for Gujarat’s Ministry of Communications, said, “As the country celebrated the #DroneMahotsav2022, the Department of Posts, successfully conducted a pilot test to deliver parcels through drones in Kutch, Gujarat.”
“Technology needs to create real value for society by providing better accessibility to services. The TechEagle team is proud to partner with the most widely distributed postal department in the world. India Post to deliver parcels to remote and rural areas. This project was aimed to enable the faster deliveries across the country be it urban cities or any rural village. The learnings from this project would help stakeholders to scale and commercialize the Drone delivery of mail across the country,” says Anshu Abhishek, Co-founder & COO, Techeagle.
Vikram Singh, CEO and Founder, Techeagle says that drone delivery in India is no more a futuristic thing, TechEagle has already enabled Drone deliveries in more than 5 states with Govt and private organisations. TechEagle has recently launched its fully made in India flagship product Vertiplane X3- India’s fastest (120km/h) and longest range(100km) hybrid e-VTOL Drone. This Drone is delivering parcels with safety, security and reliability in multiple locations in the country. So TechEagle is fully equipped to cater to huge demand and is already scaling its manufacturing capability, operations team and Tech team to bring further capabilities into its On-Demand Drone logistics airline network.
He explains about the Vertiplane X3, which was used in the pilot project with Indian Postal Department. It is a Made-In-India hybrid e-VTOL drone with a maximum speed of 120 km/hr, distance coverage of 100 km and a payload capacity of 3 kgs. Studded with multiple fail-safe options and a dynamic design, this UAV is ideal for the delivery of cargo for healthcare, defence, maritime, hyperlocal and e-commerce.
He adds, “TechEagle has partnered with India post to do mail delivery trials and based on the success of the trials, the next phase of the project will unfold. We have been working with: Government of Telangana for Medicine from the sky project, Government of Meghalaya, Government of Himachal.”
To deliver mail in India can be a challenging task considering so many obstacles like hanging electric wires, accurate location to deliver parcel/mail and unavailability of landing spaces on rooftops and balconies. Then there are security concerns related to drone-based deliveries, since they are prone to manipulations by hacking or getting the parcel stolen, which are common in India.
Kumar replies, “Our Drones are equipped with multiple redundancies at every level to cater to safety and security aspects.” TechEagle’s Vertiplane X3 is hack proof and works on triple redundant communication and dual redundant propulsion. Similarly, it has a battery and wind failsafe. This Drone can sustain a wind speed of 45km/h and can fly in -15deg C to 60 deg C environment. It is dust and drizzle proof. Vertiplane X3 is a fully autonomous Drone, and 100s of Vertiplane X3 can be controlled and monitored from a single ground control station.
“We are building the On-demand Drone delivery network with Hub and spoke model which is controlled and monitored by us, so there is no concern of unattended delivery, hence no chance of stolen parcels. Secondly, the deliveries will happen to the common center for a colony and further distributed by a person to individual apartments and houses,” he adds.
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