Sony unveils its first drone prototypes, watch them take off

Sony is gunning for a slice of the growing drone market, showing off newly developed unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) from its just-launched drone venture, Aerosense. Unfortunately, that means these drones will only be used to service business customers, so you’ll have to look elsewhere if you want to fly something like it. Aerosense’s CTO is Kotaro Sabe, who worked on the electronics maker’s Aibo robot dog and Qrio humanoid robot, both of which were shelved when Sony shut down its entertainment robot business about 10 years ago. They can last up to two hours while driven at a maximum speed of 106 kilometers per hour.

We previously heard that Sony was working on a new drone project and now the first Sony Drone prototype has been revealed on video. The leap has been made and the first airplane-like drone, Aerosense, was unveiled on Monday.

Aerosense said it will combine these into solutions that offer measuring, surveying, observing, and inspecting to companies – which are expected to roll out in 2016.

The Sony new Aerosense drone prototype (AS-DTO1-E) uses rotating turbines to effect vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL), which is quite similar to a Harrier fighter jet.

Aerosense is Sony’s joint venture with Japanese automation company ZMP, and is expecting revenues to hit JPY10 billion ($AU116 million) by 2020. It is much smaller and lighter than the other prototype and is equipped with a camera, navigation system and GPS.