Startups, Universities Bring Drone Tech to Old-School Industries
Date Posted: April 11, 2017
Posted In: Ideas, Workforce,
From Crain’s: Even though drones fly without pilots onboard, the unmanned aircraft business could create more than 100,000 new jobs for those on the ground by 2025, according to a report from the Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International.
Many of those jobs will be generated by old-school industries including agriculture, construction, mining and utilities. Others will be created by companies, including some in the St. Louis region, that train unmanned aircraft pilots, help clients collect and analyze data harvested by drones or build the machines themselves.
In all, the global market for drone technology’s commercial applications could grow from an estimate of $2 billion in 2016 to as much as $127 billion by 2020, according to a report from the consulting group PricewaterhouseCoopers.
“That boom in the industry is definitely here. It’s a good problem to have. We can’t pump enough students through the program to meet industry demand,” said Travis Balthazor, unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) flight operations manager at Kansas State University Polytechnic.
Balthazor estimated that the university graduates 20 to 30 students from its UAS degree program each year. Kansas State also hosts outreach programs for those interested in learning more about what drones can do.
The increased interest in drones is being driven, in part, by declining prices for the aircraft themselves. Not long ago, there weren’t many commercial systems available and those on the market were pricey, hovering around $100,000 per unit, Balthazor said.
“Now, just about anybody can go out there and buy a small unmanned aircraft for easily under a thousand or a couple thousand dollars and they can do a lot with it,” he said.