Summary
The latest episode of Dr. Pawd podcast features Adam Bry, the co-founder and CEO of Skydio, a technology start-up that designs and manufactures autonomous drones with artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities. The company focuses on enabling people to capture amazing footage and perform various tasks, including industrial work and physical goods delivery, without needing an expert pilot to fly the drone.
Bry discusses how their drones look like normal ones but have an autonomy system that includes six total fisheye navigation cameras and an Nvidia TX2 computer embedded inside the hardware. These drones use computer vision and deep neural networks to make decisions, and get a three-dimensional understanding of their environment. Bry points out that Skydio intentionally used rolling shutter sensors to get better dynamic range and performance for a lower cost, even though it makes the data more complex to extract information from.
In addition to consumer use, drones are being increasingly used for industrial and commercial purposes in a variety of industries such as energy, utilities, telecommunications, rail, construction, transportation infrastructure, bridges, and roads. They are particularly useful for inspection and maintenance work, as they can provide a full digital picture of critical physical infrastructure, enabling automatic damage detection and proactive notification for issue areas.
However, there is a concern about drone use in public safety leading to infringement of privacy, and so the company has developed a set of principles for responsible drone use in public safety – the Five C's. Bry emphasizes that community engagement and transparency is critical for a successful implementation of drone programs.
Bry proposes a future possibility where drones become a network service much like cloud servers, where they can be installed anywhere and made available on demand without the need for people to physically touch them. Skydio is constantly working on new products, and they have some exciting stuff coming up that they believe will be valuable for video creation. Skydio is constantly looking for people interested in robotics, AI, and drones who want to be in a place where they can see real-world impacts for the stuff they build.
Overall, the podcast provides an in-depth understanding of drones' potential for both consumer and industrial purposes, their autonomy system, and the challenges the company faced while developing their product. The speaker also emphasizes the need for responsible drone use and community engagement and transparency while implementing drone programs. It's exciting to hear about the future possibilities of drones and how Skydio is actively working towards achieving them.
