Undoubtedly, as carriers of humans, passenger drones are and will continue to be subject to the very strictest certification and regulation requirements as well as the highest technological hurdles. It is precisely because of this that companies are still in the R&D and prototype manufacturing stage, the one which requires the most money. Combine that with the hype around Urban Air Mobility (UAM), and unsurprisingly passenger drone companies are cashing in more than all the UTM and counter-drone companies combined!

2020 Outlook: This sector will become increasingly popular not only in terms of the rising number of passenger drone concepts, but also government funding for smart city and UAM initiatives, and the plethora of conferences devoted to the topic. For this reason, we are likely to see passenger drone companies scooping a large portion of the cash again in the coming year. In fact, Joby Aviation alone with their $590 million Series C round in January 2020 has already broken records and is likely to make up a large part of the total of 2020 investments.

Hendrik Bödecker, CFO of DRONEII

Hendrik is an expert in aviation law and UAV with over 10 years of experience in the field. At Lufthansa Technik he was the single point of contact to Civil Aviation Authorities (CAA) of Germany, Middle East and Asia. He used this experience to form the backbone of regulatory expertise at Drone Industry Insights. Not only has he built up a portfolio in assisting clients in regulatory matters, but he also authors DRONEII’s yearly drone investment report.