InDro Robotics and Area X.O: A perfect match

InDro Robotics and Area X.O: A perfect match

Location, location, location.

The phrase usually applies to real estate investment, but it can also apply to Research and Development. What we mean here is that some locations can be more conducive to R&D work than others. In the case of the InDro Robotics R&D facility located in Ottawa’s technology incubator known as Area X.O – we believe we’ve found the perfect fit.

What is Area X.O?

 

Good question. We’ll let its website provide the answer in this quote:

“Area X.O is the futureplex of innovation and collaboration. Our state-of-the-art facility offers a safe and secure environment to create, test and demonstrate future mobility, autonomy and connected technologies. Any innovation. Any application. Any sector… from transportation and telecom to smart agriculture, defence, aerospace, public safety, and smart cities. Evolving from the Ottawa L5 Connected and Autonomous Vehicle (CAV) Facility, Area X.O is proudly established and led by Invest Ottawa. We passionately pursue our vision: to unleash and realize the potential, power and impact of visionary technologies to improve our world and human lives.”

Given that InDro Robotics specializes in R&D involving drones and Uncrewed Ground Vehicles (UGV) – and in remotely teleoperating both kinds of vehicles – you can see why this is a good fit. We’ve also long had a commitment to positive use-cases, working closely with a number of First Responders across the country and researchers and clients around the world. Area X.O is a perfect place to get this kind of work done. And, as you’ll see in the image below, there’s never a shortage of autonomous vehicles of one kind or another around this place:

Area X.o

A giant laboratory

 

That’s key here. While our office is great (and you’ll see that shortly), it’s the location that counts. Area X.O is a restricted facility covering a huge space: 750 hectares (or about 850 acres), offering a 16-kilometre test track perfect for testing autonomous vehicles and urban mobility. There are even traffic lights for these robots.

When you can open the back door and simply drive your robots outside for testing, that’s a huge advantage. Here’s InDro CEO Philip Reece:

“The access to a site so close to the city, which has cutting-edge connectivity including 5G and microwave communications, test tracks with simulated city infrastructure – not to mention our lab, where we literally roll our latest equipment out of the hangar and launch it into the air or send it off into the smart farm – is perfect for R&D. This allows us to develop and test our leading-edge technology so much faster.”

It’s a point echoed by Arron Griffiths, InDro’s engineering manager.

“AREA X.O is an ideal incubation environment,” he says. “It allows you enough space to both create things in an office and then take them directly outside and test them with zero logistics involved. I’ve worked at business parks and academic facilities, and going from a laboratory to real-world – there’s always a hurdle there, there’s always been a road-blocker. Here, I can take a robot out the backdoor and start testing in seconds. It’s its own little robotic ecosystem a stone’s throw away from the capital, which I’m sure is very intentional.”

 

Ottawa Robotics

More than a test-bed

While the infrastructure is impressive, and testing the latest drone or UGV is literally a short walk away, it takes more than location to build a successful R&D facility. It takes a team. And there’s a striking collection of talent in this growing InDro location, including six engineers, project managers, plus seasoned sales and support professionals. These people collaborate side-by-side. It’s the very definition of synergy.

They didn’t land there by accident. Finding people who were the right fit for an agile workplace was a key consideration in the hiring process.

“We’ve selected people based on culture fit as well as their technical know-how,” explains Griffiths. “We’re guided by the principle of collaboration and coherency in the group. We can’t have stubborn people, we can’t have ‘No’ people, because it really bogs us down in development and collaboration within a team.

“Retention of good talent is ultimately the success of any given company. So I’m trying to build the culture that I want here so that we’re all happy and productive and successful. Because happy people work, and they work their asses off.”

(If you want to see what happy people working look like, check out the photo below. You’ll meet both Luke Corbeth [L] and Anthony Guolla, seen here in the Mobile Command Centre, shortly.)

Mobile Command Center

“We do have an awesome team,” explains Peter King, InDro’s Head of Robotic Solutions. “Company culture is important.”

Peter plays key roles in business development and project management for InDro. In conjunction with Arron, he runs the Ottawa facility – and has an ideal background for the job(s). With an Economics degree, Peter worked for years at drone pioneer Aeryon Labs (now FLIR) as Director of Public Safety. He moved on to work with Uncrewed Ground Vehicles at ClearPath Robotics. Working at InDro has allowed him to maximize on that background.

“It gave me the opportunity to see the complete synergy between drones and ground vehicles,” says Peter. “And InDro became such a great fit because now I can focus on both at the same time.”

As of November of 2021, Peter has been with InDro for one year. Like pretty much everyone at this company, he gets real satisfaction seeing technology developed by the firm.

“We’re a Research & Development organization first; we love to tackle new and existing problems,” he explains. “We also have a solid process to allow clients to jump into the technology without a significant capital expenditure upfront.”

Canada Drones

The R&D mission…

 

That’s one of the key things to know about InDro Robotics: At its core, it’s a Research and Development company. Yes, InDro does offer UAV and UGV services directly to customers, along with high-level training. Yes, the firm has carried out groundbreaking trials such as delivering Automated External Defibrillators or simulated blood products by drone. But there’s a strong emphasis on developing new core technologies either directly for a client, or on identifying ways to do things better. Once those opportunities or technology gaps have been identified, InDro then conceives, develops, tests – and ultimately sells – a solution.

“We may not ever become the company that has the most deployment of robots,” says Peter King, “but we play a big part in expanding the industry as a whole.”

For an example, look no further than InDro’s ROS-IN-A-BOX, a bolt-on system that turns a UGV platform into a fully functioning robot without all the usual hassle. (We won’t get into explaining it here, but do recommend this story.)

 

Canada Robotics

Building from scratch

 

Conceiving a new product or solution is, in some ways, the easy part. It’s one thing to come up with an idea, and quite something else to design, build and test a solution. But this is the kind of challenging work InDro engineers truly love, even though progress is measured in a series of small, incremental steps that ultimately add up to that giant leap.

“Engineers are very goal-oriented,” says Arron Griffiths. “So the micro-achievements keep you going. And actually, the major achievement at the end when we’ve done something – it’s kind of like relief. And that relief then allows us to celebrate.”

We asked Ahmad Tamimi – InDro’s first Area X.O hire – about working as an R&D engineer. Here’s what he said:

“Some of the things we’re building are not just niche – but really new. So we need to build things that have never been made before.”

But how do you get there? How do you go from a concept to a finished product? Very methodically, says Ahmad.

“The first step is to translate the strategic idea. Once you do that, you start decomposing the project – you break down the structures. Let’s say the end goal is XYZ. You take this and translate it into more technical terms. Technical team members will (then) really start to understand the end goal, what’s needed to be build – even the time needed, along with the budget and cost.”

All of those steps are written down in logical order, as kind of a blueprint for proceeding from beginning to end.

(That’s Ahmad, by the way, in the photo below.)

Drone Engineers

Meet the team

 

Though we’ve touched on a few members already, you now have significantly more context around why InDro Robotics has chosen Area X.O, and what the team is up to. So let’s introduce you to everyone who helps make that place hum.

Peter King, Head of Robotic Solutions

You’ll remember Peter – the guy who worked at Aeryon Labs and Clearpath Robotics. He’s passionate about technology, great at doing demos for clients, and firmly believes InDro Robotics is well-poised for the future.

“The industry is finally at the point now where the technology is good enough to start deploying robots in volume, at scale,” he says. “In the past it has struggled with things like low-latency communications, which has been solved with 5G technology. We’ve also seen significant progress in areas like AI and really smart autonomy.”

As the industry moves forward, Peter stresses that robotics can help solve labor issues – not create them.

“We’re not focused on replacing people’s jobs, but we are focused on re-deployment. So getting robots to do the dirty, dangerous, mundane jobs so we can get to where can focus on people doing jobs that are more efficient.”

Peter (along with BC-based CEO Philip Reece), is very much the client-facing side of InDro Robotics. He manages high-level partnerships and also plays a key role in InDro’s strategic growth plan.

Peter King

Peter works closely with another very capable person: Luke Corbeth.

Luke Corbeth, Account Executive

Luke’s university studies were split between finance and digital innovation. That’s a perfect skillset for this job, which involves understanding the needs of business clients – and being up to speed on the pointy edge of technology. (You saw Luke earlier, sitting on the left in that mobile command centre.)

Luke specializes in UAV and UGV solutions that involve infrastructure inspection or delivery.

“At a high level, the R&D team comes up with some sort of product – and often these products are useful across multiple verticals,” he says.

“My role is to identify the most promising verticals and approach them from cradle to implementation. I think we have a unique combination at InDro of technical knowledge, regulatory knowledge and resources. These three things help us stand out, and we can be faster to market with a superior product.”

(If you’re interested in learning more about those products, you can reach Luke here.)

But – and this is the perfect transition to the introduction of our Ottawa engineering staff – it’s the engineers who create those products.

“The heart of InDro Robotics is the engineers. Their goal is to make robots as accessible as possible, and they do it with cutting-edge technology.”

Canada Drones

Arron Griffiths, Engineering Manager

From building robots for nuclear facility inspections in the UK through to bipedal robots, Arron has a wealth of experience designing, building and testing devices meant to solve problems. He also happens to be very good with people – a skill so important to InDro in our highly collaborative Area X.O facility. He quietly mentors younger engineers, encouraging them to pursue innovations they’re passionate about.

And he absolutely thrives in the agile environment.

“I’ve worked at universities and nuclear power stations,” he says. “They all talk the talk and want things to be real-world ready. But they never give you enough space to enable that – you always need a meeting to talk about it, to pack up, to leave. All of that is gone here (at Area X.O). You make your changes to the product quickly and then send it back out.”

Ahmad Tamimi – R&D Engineer

Ahmad was the first engineer at InDro’s Area X.O location, which meant he had the first choice of desks. It also meant, for part of the pandemic, he was the only person in the building.

Robotics Engineer
Area x.o

 

Because he was InDro’s first person on-site, Ahmad also developed a great relationship with the Area X.O managers.

Lately, he’s been kept busy with multiple projects, including working with telecom carrier Ericsson to enable ultra low-latency drone operations using the 5G network. He’s worked on ROS-IN-A-BOX, and – like Griffiths – mentors the “very talented” younger engineers who have recently come on staff.

“It’s so they don’t have to start from zero,” he explains.

Ahmad also has a background in cybersecurity and sees interesting times ahead:

“The gap between the digital and physical worlds is narrowing,” he says. “Drones are just one aspect of a growing Internet of Things universe. So I see real risks in this area – plus tremendous opportunities.”

Austin Greisman – Robotics Engineer

Prior to joining InDro, Austin worked at Ericsson – the cellular provider that is always up to interesting things in its own Skunk Works-type lab. While there, he built an LTE-enabled drone.

If you’re in the industry, you’ll be aware that drones capable of operating over cellular networks can be operated remotely – providing there’s a cellular network at both ends and you have the required regulatory permissions. It’s an area the firm has been innovating in for several years now, so Austin was already coming from a place that would be a good fit. What we didn’t know when he was hired, was how incredibly eloquent he could be when describing his passion for technology. Just have a listen to why he’s enjoyed being involved with the ROS-IN-A-BOX project:

“I like it because I love robots. It’s the beautiful harmony between hardware and software.

“It’s the beginning parts of a system that can be truly useful for a customer, where they can plop it onto a system and make it a robot that’s smart.”

Austin also believes the world is on the cusp of exponential growth of the adoption of robotics. He believes companies like InDro, by making robots more accessible to non-technical users, will play a significant role.

“It’s limited right now by barrier to entry. So by moving that barrier, I think there will be a massive explosion (of adoption),” he says.

Robotics Engineer

Ella Hayashi – Junior Engineer (Software)

As a student, Ella used to occasionally offer her expertise at an Ericsson project known as “The Garage.” Basically, the ‘garage’ was a spot within Ericsson where the company offered funding to internal startups. Ella got involved.

It was while helping out in The Garage that she became really interested in the Robot Operating System software, known as ROS (and half the equation in our ROS-IN-A-BOX).

With a BSc in Computer Science, Ella is working more on the software side of things. She started in October of 2021 and already is currently working on product documentation so that clients can fully understand and exploit InDro products. She’s also involved with preparing internal tutorials on Gazebo – powerful simulation software for robot building and testing – and the Robot Operating System (ROS) software.

I like that my work allows me to learn the really cool and interesting stuff, but also my work helps other people learn as well, so it’s a great position to be in!” she says.

Ella adds one more thing:

“I love working here.”

Robotics Engineer

Kaiwen Xu – Systems Engineer

InDro’s most recent Area X.O hire (and there have been many this year), is Kaiwen Xu. He comes to us after a six-year stint with MicroPilot, a leading manufacturer of autopilot systems – both hardware and software. Kaiwen was involved with programming control systems for all configurations of UAVs, including standard multi-rotor designs, fixed-wing aircraft, fixed-wing VTOLs and even helicopter-style drones.

Already, Kaiwen has seen the tremendous advantages offered by the Area X.O location.

It’s the perfect place for drone and ground vehicle development and testing,” he says.

“Most drone companies I’ve dealt with previously had to drive a long way outside the city to do a flight test. Here at Area X.O, you can take off anytime you want, and you don’t have to worry about forgetting a battery or screwdriver.” (Anyone who’s worked at a drone startup will know exactly what Kaiwen is talking about!)

Like others here, he’s fascinated by the daily intersection between hardware and software.

Robotics is a fun industry. You write some code and flash it to the circuit board – and the robot will work as you asked it to do.”

Yes, he says, sometimes there are bugs – which can lead to frustrating hunts through endless lines of code to identify and mitigate the issue. But when that process ends with success (as it inevitably does), Kaiwen says there’s a real feeling of satisfaction.

Canada Robotics

Anthony Guolla – R&D Sales/Engineer

Anthony is a rare breed: He’s both an engineer and a person on the sales side of things. We’ve saved Anthony for last because his position is both unique – and also reflects the importance InDro places on understanding its clients.

“While Luke is more focused on robots doing things, my sales side would be to deal with people building robots, rather than buying what those robots can do.”

Cool. And because he’s an engineer, he can hop in when the rest of the engineering team needs a hand. Plus, he can speak with other engineers from the client side on the same level.

“There’s a certain engineering framework or methodology, so I can tap into how they’re thinking about their product and get a sense of what they’re looking for and what they want.”

 

Robotics Engineers

Of course, part of his job is to help potential clients understand the capabilities of the AgileX UGVs – InDro’s platform of choice for ground robotics.

“They’re very powerful, great pieces of hardware,” he says. “It’s exciting to work with them. I try, as much as possible, to get clients to do a hands-on demo. Once they have their hands on the joystick, they love it.”

Speaking of that, Anthony here echoes Ella.

“I love my job. My job’s great.”

And, as engineering lead Arron Griffiths observed earlier: Happy people work hard.

And these people do. Every single one of them.

On the scene: InDro Robotics – in Saudi Arabia

On the scene: InDro Robotics – in Saudi Arabia

At InDro Robotics, it’s fair to say we receive inquiries from all over the world.

Some inquiries are about our R&D, and whether we might create a solution for a client’s problem. Others are about InDro’s many services – ranging from training and certification to hands-on service provision. And sometimes, companies simply want to tap into our expertise, to see if we can help them out with a job.

We don’t say that to brag, but to help explain how and why our own Dr. Eric Saczuk happened to recently be flying drone missions in Saudi Arabia. One more bit of background: Eric is an expert when it comes to drones and data capturing and interpretation. He has a PhD in Remote Sensing and – in addition to working for InDro Robotics – is also head of the RPAS (drone) Hub at the BC Institute of Technology.

That’s why Eric is one of our “go-to” pilots when it comes to complex data acquisition missions. He travels a lot – but why this trip to Saudi Arabia?

“I went to essentially help a company develop their drone inspection and survey program,” he explains. The company (Co-Mender, which specializes in concrete infrastructure inspection and repair) had purchased a DJI M300 from Canada and hadn’t flown it yet. The firm also had a couple of critical inspections they wanted to get done ASAP.

So Eric hopped on a jet, and 17 hours later arrived somewhere decidedly less green than his home base of Vancouver. He took this snap while on the trip:

Saudi Drone Inspection

Getting the drone to fly…

 

Normally, this is the easy part. You set up the machine, ensure the firmware is updated, do a physical inspection, check that all permissions have been obtained and that it’s generally safe to proceed. (There are other steps, but you get the drift.) Except in this case, there was a problem – even though it was a brand new enterprise drone that had never been flown.

They turned it on, and, well, nothing.

“Their drone was actually region-locked to North America, so there was no way it would turn on in Saudi Arabia. So the first order of business was to figure out how to unlock it. As soon as the drone turned on it was saying ‘I’m in Saudia Arabia, I’m not supposed to be here. I will not turn on.'” (Well, it wasn’t literally saying that, but that was the gist of the message popping up on the controller.)

The clients, of course, were concerned. Their brand-new drone wasn’t working and they had time-sensitive jobs to do. So Eric set to work.

Canada Drone Companies

The path to a solution

After trying everything he could think of related to firmware hacks, Eric contacted InDro’s engineering team and reached out to DJI’s Enterprise side for support. While waiting for some a workaround and not one to waste time, Eric borrowed a DJI Mavic Air 2 from a company hired to create video content about the projects. This allowed for the capture of preliminary photogrammetry of the bridge. Eric also took ground-based DSLR photos from the ground, shooting upward to capture the underside of the bridge.

Drone photos are all geo-referenced, meaning they contain metadata that places the photo in 3-D space at a specific time. But, with rare exceptions, DSLR images do not contain that kind of data. So how would these images be integrated? Well, the photogrammetry software is capable of picking out common features in any kind of imagery, whether aerial or terrestrial. So once it understood what a certain pillar looked like, for example, the software integrated those DSLR photos and a rough 3D digital twin could be created.

But the project required an accurate digital model, which mean that they still needed that M300 to fly. Finally, says Eric, the answer came from DJI support.

“Within two days, we had a solution from DJI to apply for a geo-unlock prior to each flight,” he explains. “It was not ideal, but it allowed us to get the jobs done.”

Several days later, Eric began re-flying the bridge mission, using the M300 to capture the structure from all angles (including from below, with the gimbal tilted upward). There were issues with dust, as the M300 kicked up a fair bit when flying beneath the low bridge. In fact, Eric had to pause the mission from time to time to wipe the lens clean.

M300 Drone

M300 back in action

 

With the M300 back in action, Eric was able to proceed with the mission with the ultimate goal of producing a complete digital twin of the bridge (a 3D digital reconstruction of the physical site, which is very useful for inspection purposes). Engineers use these digital twins to look at the asset and inspect it from all angles. If they find areas of concern, seeing the high-res images associated with that spot are just a few clicks away. In this case, the firm was attempting to determine whether the bridge should be repaired or replaced.

Then it was on to the next mission.

“The other site was about 50 kilometres southeast of the mountainous town of Al-Bahah. Here, the team was dealing with a dangerous 80-metre high rock cliff adjacent to a recently twinned highway,” explains Eric. “They were quite concerned about the high risk of rock fall activity and needed to engineer mitigative structures to stabilize the slope. In order to proceed, they needed detailed contours so their engineering team could design these structures.”

M300 Drone

If only there was a video…

Words and photos are nice, but sometimes a video can really give you a better sense of the job. Thankfully, Co-Mender pulled one together and has given us permission to share it. You’ll get a glimpse of the work InDro’s Dr. Saczuk carried out:

So, how did it go?

 

According to Eric, very well. Putting an enterprise drone to work, in conjunction with an excellent ground crew and reliable photogrammetry software, produced impressive results.

“I think ultimately it was quite shocking for the client: To be able to fly the drone for a couple of hours to collect the imagery, and within 24 hours deliver to them accurate contours. That was something they had never had access to before on that short of a timeline and that level of accuracy. To have surveyed that slope manually and generate contours would have taken probably taken two weeks.”

 

M300 Drone

‘A memorable trip

 

Eric says he met a really great team at Co-Mender and Gulf Crete (the support company), including one engineer who wanted to soak up as much knowledge as humanly possible during his stay. Eric also really enjoyed experiencing Saudi Arabia for the first time.

“I was quite keen on experiencing the culture – and I’m glad I did. I met incredibly friendly people and saw such diversity – everything from 400-year-old villages to a theme park that was like New York/Vegas.”

Eric also sends a ‘Thank You’ to Ian Wills, the President of Coastal Drone Co. It was Ian who connected the client with InDro Robotics.

 

InDro’s View

 

We are pleased with the outcome of this trip – simply because the client was happy. We perhaps don’t advertise these services as much as we should, but InDro has a full team of engineers and expert pilots (both of drones and Uncrewed Ground Vehicles), who are happy to help with solutions and training pretty much anywhere on the planet.

“A lot of foundations at InDro are based on providing unique and specialized training and solutions for clients,” says Eric. “And there have already been discussions on how we now take that to an even greater scale.”

If you have a problem…we’d love to help you solve it. Get in touch here.

 

The InDro Robotics “InDro Commander” for ground robots

The InDro Robotics “InDro Commander” for ground robots

By Scott Simmie, InDro Robotics

 

Today, building basic robots isn’t hugely challenging for engineers – though, of course, some robots are a lot more complex than others.

The really tough part is making those robots be useful.  Tasks like navigating, capturing thermal imagery and other data – even identifying and manipulating objects – all require much more than wheels and sensors and end effectors (the robotic equivalent of hands). Regardless of whether the robot is simple or complex, it needs brains.

Those brains consist of both hardware and software, with specific bundles of code that can help with specific tasks. And that’s where the Robot Operating System, or ROS, comes into play. ROS.org is a repository of software packages, purpose-built for specific robotic applications by a global network of collaborators.

 

via ROS.org

As the organization’s website explains it, ROS “is a collection of tools, libraries, and conventions that aim to simplify the task of creating complex and robust robot behavior across a wide variety of robotic platforms.

“Why? Because creating truly robust, general-purpose robot software is hard. From the robot’s perspective, problems that seem trivial to humans often vary wildly between instances of tasks and environments. Dealing with these variations is so hard that no single individual, laboratory, or institution can hope to do it on their own.”

And so ROS could be thought of as a super helpful toolkit, where collaborators upload and share code they’ve developed – and also download and integrate (or even modify) code others have written in order to make their robot carry out required tasks, including specific ways of communicating with an operator or base station.

 

ROS is cool, but could it be even cooler?

 

Some time back, we started to ponder this question. Specifically, what if you could pack some of that software in a box – along with the hardware required to run it? And what if that box could easily be integrated to a ground-based robot (most already use ROS drivers) to get it up and running as seamlessly as possible?

That’s the concept of a new InDro Robotics product called InDro Commander, developed by Engineering Manager Arron Griffiths in conjunction with the InDro Robotics Area X.O team.

Arron had been working with ROS for about five years, so he already had a great understanding of the available software tools. Arron has worked in robotics for more than a decade now (he was also the Senior Application Engineer at Clearpath Robotics prior to joining InDro Robotics). And Unmanned Ground Vehicles, or UGVs, is an area that has really picked up for InDro since we partnered with Chinese robotics leader AgileX. The picture below is of “Scout” – one the company’s UGVs.

 

AgileX Scout

With a solid understanding of the software and the hardware required to run it, Arron realized there could be tremendous potential for an “all-in-one, bolt-on” solution. Such a device could get an ROS-compatible robot up and running much more quickly, with zero hassle. In a nutshell, that’s the concept behind InDro Commander. Here’s Arron:

“We’ve created a hardware product around the concept of a simple ROS module, which can be utilized on multiple different robot types. We’re also trying to make it platform-agnostic. We actually don’t want to make a robotic platform, we want to make a box that has robotic systems in it, to make other robotic platforms smarter.”

We’ve been using our InDro Commander on the AgileX Scout Mini, a great R&D platform. And, well, it works like a charm. InDro Commander is also compatible with all the AgileX platforms and any other ROS-ready robot platform.

In fact, we’re so proud of this InDro Robotics innovation that we produced this video for the recent ROS World 2021 Virtual Conference. (At that time, we were calling it ROS-IN-A-BOX):

 

InDro Commander integrates easily

 

That’s a key piece here. The box contains everything a developer or end-user would need. EDGE computing is done onboard by the NVIDIA Jetson processor, reducing latency and unlocking potential for AI-related tasks like object recognition or change detection. Connectivity is via 4G/5G, and the box can utilize the CAN (Controller Area Network) protocol, Serial or Ethernet. The ruggedized box has its own cooling system and power regulator, and has an Ingress Protection factor of IP55. It’s literally a solution you can bolt onto pretty much any ground-based robot and begin remote teleoperations over 4G or 5G.

And yes, InDro Commander vastly simplifies things.

“It’s just two wires (battery power and communications) people plug in,” says Arron. “The box already has cameras, communications, power regulators – all inside the box. So you’re not fiddling with all of these various peripherals. It’s truly a self-contained ecosystem. Suppliers, OEMs, they don’t have to think – they just have to bolt this box on.”

ROS-IN-A-BOX

InDro Robotics has long been known for its R&D in the drone space, and has garnered multiple industry “firsts” as a result. Now, with the company’s expansion into ground robotics, InDro Commander is a significant breakthrough – not only for InDro, but for others who will immediately see the benefit of this solution.

“We work closely with academia and collaborate with industry partners and end users,” explains InDro Robotics CEO Philip Reece.

“The common question is: ‘How can we integrate this sensor or piece of tech with this robot or system?’ Now we have a simple working answer to this question, as InDro Commander is designed as a Plug and Play all-in-one module and is platform agnostic.” (Providing the platform either has a ROS driver already, or working example (Python/C++) code which Indro can use to develop a custom ROS driver.)

ROS-IN-A-BOX

Reece says the creation of this product is a very different solution, which he anticipates will help many in the Unmanned Ground Vehicle (UGV) space.

“There are many UGV companies, and more start up every day. Ninety-five per cent of them only make custom solutions for their own. hardware. InDro is doing things differently,” he says.

“InDro Commander is an important addition to our technology development, as we are supplying the industry with a number of different ground robots, and they are interacting in many different ways. InDro Commander will build on the benefits of a common operating system such as ROS, by bringing a standard suite of sensors and systems (camera, GPS, IMU, Computers Power distribution, communications, 4/5G) that can all be simply but powerfully integrated onto any flavour of UGV.”

InDro partners with ROCOS

We’re already quite proud of the InDro Commander solution. But we’ve taken things a step further, partnering with ROCOS. The company’s Robot Operations Platform allows an operator to connect, monitor and control robots – whether it’s a single unit or an entire fleet. But that’s not all.

ROCOS was recently acquired by DroneDeploy, one of the world leaders in drone data acquisition, interpretation and photogrammetry. And what does that mean? Well, imagine having data acquired by a ground robot seamlessly integrated with what is captured by air and presented as meaningful data for the end-user. Further picture a desktop, browser-based console where you can program aerial or ground-based missions and monitor a feed as they unfold in real-time.

Force multiplier

Whether the use-case is industrial, agricultural, security – and much more – having eyes in the air, combined with robotic boots on the ground, can only be a force multiplier.

We’ve already seen what InDro Commander can do in our own testing; we can’t wait to see what others do with this solution.

For more information on InDro Commander, contact us here.