Many entrepreneurship (Switzerland) with gentle drone regulations and federal university human resources System consistency with the EU and the United States is an issue

In Switzerland, the drone industry is developing near Rosanne and Zurich near the Swiss Federal University of Technology.In these areas, the number of related startups is said to be 40 or 70.The reason for this is that the area is formed by companies and research institutions that have technical advantage, such as artificial intelligence (AI) technology used for image recognition, and the Federal Civil Federation in charge of drone regulations.The Air Bureau (FOCA) is tolerant of the new business and the regulations are gentle.

This article reports on the innovation and startup status in Switzerland.

Drone companies are accumulated around Rosanne and Zurich

In Switzerland, there are some cases where startups with unique technologies have been accumulated, and associations have been established.The Crypto Valley Association, which supports the startups of cryptographic assets (cryptocurrency) technology using blockchain near Tark, the food Nutrition Valley Association, which supports the startups of food, nutrition and hotel service -related technologies, and also near LosanneDigital Trust Technology and Cyber Security -related Trust Valley Association.

"Valley" is the name of an industrial cluster related to Silicon Valley.However, in Switzerland, the main cities are developed along the glacier lake, so it is also a "valley" in the terrain.According to Professor Gusendner -Toben, who is in charge of open innovation at the Swiss Federal University of Technology School (EPFL), the industrial cluster of Nuchatel's precision machinery is "Precision Valley", Geneva's Biotec industrial cluster.Is called "health volleyball".

As for drones, many spin -off companies have appeared from EPFL and Zurich Federal University of Technology (ETHZ).In addition, in collaboration with nearby Nano Tech Research Institute CSEM (Nuchatel) and AI Research Institute IDIAP (Valley), companies are accumulating near Loresanne and Zurich.This industrial integration is called "Drone Valley" for EPFL, ETHZ, and trade investment institutions S-GE.The Grator Zurich area of the regional promotion agency (the range is in the eastern Switzerland of Switzerland) and the Greater Geneva Bern area (Each Switzerland from Geneva to Bern) is "Home of of the Switzerland).It is called a drone.

In addition, Swiss Post, Swisscom, Zurich Institute of Technology and FOCA participated, and Autonomus Valley (meaning the valley of autonomous flight), which aims for the development of drone business, was established in 2020.In Lugano, Southern Tichino, it seems that there is a demonstration test for blood sample transportation between hospitals, and companies near Zurich and Da Vendorf Airport (Army Port near Zurich) are active.

As industrial accumulation progresses, many drone startups appear.It has been featured in various acceleration programs and awards.In the award system "Best Startup 100", a venture company supported by the Innosuis of the Federal Government, drone -related startups are selected every year (4th, 2019 1st, 4th, 2018, 2018).4th, 7th).

Eco -system with a large presence of Federal Institute of Technology

The biggest reason that the drone industry is growing in Switzerland is the people from the Federal Institute of Technology, which conducts related research.EPFL is known for its robotics.Flying robots are being studied in the university's intelligent system lab (LIS).In addition, computer -related research is being promoted in computer vision lab (CVLAB) (for example, 3D digital map creation and object detection from camera images taken with drones).Including Freiability, which was ranked first in the Best Startup 100 in 2019 (see Business Bank dated September 17, 2019), and a sense fly (described later) acquired by Paro in the same year, awarded the European Business Awards.There are many companies spin -off from EPFL.In addition, the Innovation Park attached to EPFL (one of the five federal industry -academia -collaborative industrial parks in Switzerland) holds the EPFL Drone Day, a meeting that gathers government agencies and industries (2020.The year is canceled).

The drone race on the EPFL Drone Day 2019 (Jetro photography)

On the other hand, at the Zurich Federal University of Technology (ETHZ), located in German -speaking countries, the autonomous system lab (ASL) continues to develop systems that can autonomously respond to dynamic changes in the external environment.。Created drone -related startups such as wing tigers (described later), Bolilo, Atlank Cook Solar, and others.In addition, the ANY Botics (4 -legged robot), which was awarded the best startup at the Swiss Economic Forum in 2020, also spin -off.Professor Roland Seagwalt, who led ASL, is the founder of the Startup Training Institution, Bis Zurich, in collaboration with the University of Zurich (State State).Bis Zurich was established by the donation of Hansyoorg Bis from Switzerland, and supports startups mainly as research facilities in regenerative medicine and robotics.ETHZ's Dynamic Systems Control Research Institute (IDSC) is also conducting aggressive research activities related to drones.

Another characteristic in Switzerland is the "PX4" common software, which can be said to be a drone control OS.First, the development project of a control device, "Pixhawk", which began in 2009 in ETHZ, triggered the number of drone services that adopt an open source flight control program.Since 2011, the Pix Hawk project spin -off company has begun developing PX4, providing development kit (SDK) and adding image analysis programs.Currently, PX4 is also used in the US Army, Wal -Mart, and Amazon.The wing tiger in the 2020 "Best Startup 100" also uses PX4.

In addition, there are startups that provide necessary wind tunnel experiments and air -resistant testing services at the drone research and development stage, such as wind shape, and support the Swiss drone development.

From November to December 2020, the Swiss De Loan Industrial Tour on the Swiss Drone Eco System is being held.Here, various players supporting the drone industry were systematically introduced.FOCA, who is in charge of drone regulations and actively engage in dialogue with the industry, the Drone Society Association (DIAS), which coordinates regulations with the EU of drones, Certx, which conducts drone risk assessment, federal engineeringUniversity, CSEM, IDIAP, and IDSIA (AI research institution in Tichino) participated.Looking at this, it can be seen that related services such as human resource development, cooperation system, and certification in Switzerland have also appeared in Switzerland.

Various business models, from aircraft development to autonomous flight and image analysis

In the map surveying field, various drone -related companies are developing business, from aircraft development to autonomous flight and image analysis.Founded in 2009, the sense fly has developed a drone that can be moved at high speed with a fixed wing type that can be vertically separated.It provides drones that can shoot 3D images on the ground surface more efficiently and wider.The company was acquired by a French drone giant para and became a subsidiary.In addition, Pix4D, which performs drone image analysis with AI, provides photography data processing services for various drone companies.

Some companies provide stable flight and inspection services due to drones indoors and narrow pipes for inspection and observation of infrastructure.For example, EPFL spin -off flyability is a company that provides inspection services in narrow places such as nuclear power plants and gas pipes (Note).The EPFL spin -off drawnistics develops a foldable drone similar to flyability.Its features are that there is little risk in the event of a human body contact, and it is specialized in transporting up to the zero -centimeter of the user.

In the agricultural field, Aero41 provides drug spraying services in Bo State, where the scenery of the grapes and slope is registered as a World Heritage Site.

As mentioned above, in the transportation fields such as chemicals and mail, Swiss mail conducted a demonstration test for autonomous flight in Tichino, southern Switzerland.Start -up Rigitechnology has developed a sample transport for blood tests in 27 countries, including Africa.These transports are not yet out of the demonstration tests currently being conducted in each country.Nevertheless, it is characterized by being actively promoting demonstration tests for non -visual and visual transportation, taking advantage of the gentle flight regulations of Switzerland.

In recent years in Switzerland, a preliminary award or an acceleration program has been selected for a drone startup (see Table 1).

Source: Create JETRO based on information such as each website

Slow drone flight regulations, consistency with EU, etc. are issues

In Switzerland, restrictions on flying goods other than manned flights are stipulated in the Special Category Order of the Federal Environmental Transportation Energy Communications (DETEC), the Ordinance on Special Category Aircraft, 1994.The government ordinance is unmanned or powerless, such as hangriders, manned tako, mooring balloons, parachuts, and drones.According to these regulations, Switzerland can fly a drone in Most of the regions in Japan without prior approval of the Federal Aviation Bureau (FOCA) as long as possible.In addition, there are special cases when flying from a drone viewpoint that is not directly visible like a drone race, such as when used for pesticides spraying.When shooting a densely populated area from the sky, the risk assessment is performed and the FOCA is approved, so that a drone flight is possible (see Figure).

Source: Created JETRO from the FOCA site

The Swiss Federation of Civil Drones, Swiss Federation of Civil Drones, is a group established in 2014 and has a license test for drone pilots.As of 2019, 808 corporate and individual members belong.Licensing is divided into UNO and Duo by required specialized knowledge.The license registration fee is 200 Swiss francs (about 23,400 yen, CHF, 1chf = 117 yen) and 350chf.Due to the current regulations of Switzerland, the pilot does not need a license under conditions such as aircraft under 30 kilograms.So what this system is needed is operated as a means to achieve the technical level of the pilot according to the difficulty of operations such as demonstration.In addition, when consistent EU regulations (described later), all drone flights are required for all drone flights.In the future, this response seems to have been taken in mind.SFCD regularly exchange opinions with European Airlines Safety Organization (EASA, EU drone regulation authorities).

The recent topic of regulations is the consistency of domestic laws in the EU's drone regulation (EU implementation rules 2019/947) announced by EASA in May 2019.The EU sets a new regulatory system (reference reference) that divides the drone into three categories.It has been enforced since the end of December 2020.For Switzerland, domestic consistency with EU's air regulations, including drones, is an important issue for Switzerland in the EU and in the aviation agreement.

Until now, in Switzerland, the regulations on drone flights have been gentle as mentioned.In particular, registration of pilots has been basically unnecessary.In contrast, the EU regulation will be required to register an aircraft exceeding 250 grams.Due to this opposition to the reinforcement of regulations, the Diet has been issued to the Diet that opposes the consistency with the EU regulation.Under such circumstances, FOCA has announced the postponement of consistency, which was initially scheduled for January 2021.The new consistency date has not been revealed so far.