Flying a drone indoors for mission-critical tasks is challenging because of a lack of satellite navigation and complex environments. Cleo Robotics Inc. today announced the availability of its Dronut X1 drone for law-enforcement, industrial inspection, construction, and defense markets. The Boston-based company claimed that it is the first company to successfully develop a stable and highly maneuverable ducted bi-rotor drone.
“Built to solve what had been thought of as unsolvable technical challenges with ducted-fan aerial vehicles, we developed and tested the Dronut platform through rigorous and innovative engineering,” stated Omar Eleryan, founder and CEO of Cleo Robotics. “We are excited to see the impact that the Dronut X1 will have on the industries that it is designed to serve.”
“Having worked in the oil industry, I experienced the dangers and costs associated with confined space inspections,” he said. “The Dronut X1 is the solution that removes the need to risk humans’ safety on the job.”
Cleo designs Dronut X1 for safety, agility
Cleo Robotics said it is the first company to successfully develop a stable and highly maneuverable ducted bi-rotor drone. The company said its patented thrust-vectoring technology makes the hyper-efficient ducted fan design stable in flight. The Dronut’s completely enclosed propellers enable the X1 to safely bounce off objects and people and is a fraction of the size of similarly featured drones, it added.
Weighing under 16 oz. (170 g), and measuring 6.5 in. (16.51 cm) across, the Dronut X1 is the first professional-grade, collision-tolerant, safe-to-touch, intelligent drone, said Cleo Robotics. It has a patented, enclosed ducted-fan design that prevents damage to its propellers.
The Dronut X1’s intelligence and sensing includes lidar-powered obstacle detection. Its sensor suite is built for image and data collection with high-definition video and pictures and 3D point-cloud output, said the MassRobotics resident.
In addition, Dronut X1 can carry advanced payloads and can come in direct contact with people without risk of harm, Cleo said. The frame is built from carbon-fiber composite materials for durability and reliability even in tight spaces.
The Dronut X1 pilot assist – powered by Qualcomm Snapdragon – is designed to make flying easier and safer, allowing the operator to focus on collecting the data they need instead of manually managing the drone’s flight. It can operate around sensitive equipment and in low-light conditions.
Dronut goes where no drone has gone before
For industrial and commercial applications, the Dronut X1 now enables unmanned inspections of dangerous and confined spaces where no drone or robot could previously go, such as tanks, pressure vessels, and crawl spaces, said Cleo Robotics.
The Dronut X1 is a portable, rugged and reliable intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) system for GPS-denied environments, making it ideal for defense use cases, said Cleo.
Law enforcement can benefit from a highly intelligent device that can scout areas in advance of deploying officers into high-risk situations. For facility security, the company added, the drone is suitable as a flying surveillance camera.
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