Japan’s NEC Boasts About Passenger Drone That Can Stay In The Air For A Minute

Japan may soon become the pioneer in the passenger drone development in the world thanks to NEC Corp’s recent contribution. On August 05, the company announced a test flight of its quadcopter demo that can take people to the air in about one minute. The flight took place in a safety cage of a test facility, Abiko, in the suburb of Tokyo.

Powered by battery, the passenger drone, in fact, didn’t carry any passenger when it flew to the 10-foot height before landing on the ground. Bloomberg reported that this was the first time a big corporation from Japan demoed such a flying vehicle. As NEC Corp’s partner, Cartivator hopes to begin mass production of this product in 2026.

In an interview with Bloomberg, the project leader of NEC Kouji Okada said, "Japan is a densely populated country and that means flying cars could greatly alleviate the burden on road traffic. We are positioning ourselves as an enabler for air mobility, providing location data and building communications infrastructure for flying cars."

Based on the current infrastructure plan of Japan, using such drones for delivery missions is expected to begin in 2023. In addition, the Japanese government also hopes that passenger drones can be used to bring people in the next 10 years. Meanwhile, venture capitalists in the country have made an investment on autonomous flying vehicles companies via an investment fund called Drone Fund.

However, both Japan and NEC Corp will have to make much more efforts to handle a series of difficulties from regulatory issues, safety, to battery life, and complete these goals. The weight of NEC’s passenger drone is around 150 kg and its dimension is 3.9m (L) X 3.7m (W) X 1.3m (H). It’s not easy for any drone with such the dimension and weight, which can load goods or passengers, to stay in the air in a few minutes.

In addition to NEC, there have been a lot of other companies developing self-driving aircraft. Singapore, New Zealand, and the United Arab Emirates are also aiming at this industry. Besides, some private companies from Volvo, Uber, to Kitty Hawk founded by Google founder Larry Page have developed similar machines.

Compared to their rival companies, NEC Corp and Cartivator have held some certain advantages due to the support of the Japanese government. Cartivator has recently been allowed to conduct outdoor flights.

With the growing technological advancement, India is a country where new technologies are quickly adopted or created, drones are no exception. One of the most widely seen applications of drones is in shooting scenes, here are drone camera prices in India.