How Drones Are Transforming Business

U.S. businesses can’t wait to put drones to work. At Kiplinger, we expect the government to set rules that will allow commercial use of small drones, say, under 55 pounds, in the next year or two. When that happens, look for a new business sector, worth billions and employing thousands, to take off, literally.

Here are some industries eager to take advantage of drones.

For farmers, the ability to check on acres and acres of crops from above is a huge improvement over trudging through fields of crops. Drones will let them spot early signs of pests or stress. Further down the road, larger drones will be cleared to deliver needed chemicals to the plants with pinpoint accuracy. In Japan, the Yamaha RMAX drone has been doing this on steep rice fields and other locations for decades now.

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Now that even a small drone can carry a high-resolution camera, television news directors everywhere are dying to add an unmanned “eye in the sky.” Celebrities and others may object to the overhead media attention, but news gatherers won’t be shy. Same goes for filmmakers. Drones have already been used overseas to shoot movie scenes.

For mapmakers and surveyors, drones are the biggest thing since, well, global positioning. Drones will take GPS to another level. By following a programmed track while flying, drones can mark precise GPS locations on the images they collect. And boom, you’ve got an instant map of an area that might be difficult or even dangerous to cross by foot and vehicle. Trimble Navigation has a winged drone, the UX5, that can perform this function, even in bad weather.

But that’s not all these little flying machines are capable of. Read How Drones Will Transform These Six Industries to learn even more.