Further, higher, longer: how batteries are driving growth in the drone market

Battery technologies, once the rate limiting step for mobile technologies and electric vehicles, are now under the spotlight from drone manufacturers, according to industry experts from spin-out About:Energy.

Material scientist Dr Kieran O’Regan and mechanical engineer Dr Gavin White set up About:Energy four years ago, straight after finishing their PhDs at the University of Birmingham and Imperial College, London to accelerate product development in technologies using batteries. 

While the company initially focussed on the automotive market, they have recently seen a surge in interest from drone companies, as drone use has expanded rapidly in emergency response, environmental monitoring, industrial inspection, and logistics. 

It is a challenging market to operate in. With new battery chemistries coming to market, drone batteries must deliver the highest levels of performance and reliability to provide the most flight time needed to make a mission programme successful, often under demanding manoeuvres.

Kieran O’Regan explains: “Seemingly marginal improvements can make a huge difference to drone operators, and this means the right battery must be selected for the use case.  If you are inspecting a railway line, being able to fly 20kms rather than 15kms saves the time and operational cost of flying the drone back base or the operator needing to drive to the next village to replace the battery.  In this scenario it makes sense to invest more in selecting the right battery and even paying more for the technology that extends flight time.” 

But there is usually a lack of data to back up this type of decision.  Conventional testing involves building a drone, flying it manually to test the range, and this could take up to a year.  In a competitive and rapidly expanding industry manufacturers are unwilling to take more time than necessary in product development.” 

About:Energy provides a modelling platform with access to data from commonly used batteries in drones, enabling in-house teams to run simulations on a computer rather than in real life. This approach requires physical testing of the batteries in the lab to generate the high-quality data that powers the models.

Until now, the automotive industry has been the main driver of innovation in the battery market, but the founders at About:Energy believe this may be changing, especially in Europe, due to the slowdown in EV sales growth (although sales are still increasing year-on-year) and the increasing need to reduce costs, which is leading to budget cuts and greater sensitivity around growth.

There are differences in battery requirements according to use - delivery drones carrying a payload need more power than photography or infrastructure-checking drone – manufacturers are always looking for high energy density, and sufficient power for take-off, landing, mission delivery, and they are prepared to pay for this. 

The About:Energy founders see further innovation on the horizon by supporting software companies or drone OEMs developing ‘in flight’ drone management and mission planning systems, with the potential to provide live updates on environmental conditions such as wind direction, informing operators how far they can take the drone on any current day.  

Kieran O’Regan comments: “Although the drone market is still relatively small today, it is expanding rapidly, unlocking innovation that will translate into real value in our day-to-day lives over the next decade.”