Voliro Competitive Environment – Physical Interaction Drones

Competitors and potential partners in the technology

Identification of competitive environment

The relevance of the company is calculated as the similarity of their patents compared to the technology concept. The closer to the core, the higher the similarity. An identified patent is measured by the distance of its closest text element compared to the target concept. A company as the patent owner is positioned according to its closest patent’s distance. Companies are further categorized into segments based on their primary activities in terms of relevant technological applications (yellow and red segments). Specialist companies with a small but relevant portfolio are positioned separately (green segment). The bubble size reflects the number of patents in the field.

Technology concept definition

Physical interaction drones, such as for inspecting or painting industrial facilities, such as non-destructive testing of bridges, tunnels, silos, or pipes, or other concrete structures, also for inspection of storage tanks or cavities, or large structures, such as rockwork and other scenery at a theme park or architectural ornamentation which are difficult to access by the painters or inspector, that can furthermore be implemented by the human being remotely from the inspection site.

Results

Voliro’s inspection drone concept comes very close to the target definition, and only a few other players are at least as close. Two of them are the Japanese companies K Pax and Mirait. Both have patents together with the Jp. Building Research Institute on wall inspection drone systems for large buildings. This activity can be explained by the revision of Article 12 of the Building Standards Law in 2022, which will allow the use of drones for the inspection of exterior walls in Japan from that date. However, the difference in target distance to Voliro is not particularly large and is somewhat exaggerated here graphically. All of these players are very close to the target definition

In the wider environment of Voliro, we can see mainly two different types of companies: Drone and aircraft manufacturers such as Boeing or Airbus, or construction and inspection companies, especially General Electric. GE has the most patents in this area. However, similar to other players, the GE patents are not about drones themselves, but about robotic inspection methods and systems. Aircraft manufacturers are also filing patents for inspection, albeit of aircraft and not houses, and are also filing patents for drone elements.

The connection to ETH and Walt Disney patents is also visible in Voliro’s individual patents. Both also co-operate and have filed patents for either drones (e.g. painting drones) or environmental mapping methods. As we did not focus on the mapping, image processing or drone control aspects in the concept searches, other relevant patents on these additional aspects may not be visible in the analysis.