UAVs face the "Great Leap Forward" crisis, capital is difficult to join the giants

As soon as the drones appeared, they quickly became popular. Capitals poured into the drone market, and their pace continued to accelerate. The result is that homogenized drones are still evolving, and the long market return cycle has gradually eroded capital enthusiasm. Now drones are transforming to the industry level, and it is difficult to become a giant in the short term.

At the beginning, Zhang Lei, a technology-born person, was engaged in research and development at the zero-level intelligent control of the main consumer-grade (for general public aerial photography, entertainment) drones. In 2013, consumer-grade drone technology matured and he turned to entrepreneurship. After a period of time, Zhang Lei’s team of three or four people was forced to disband, and Zhang Lei re-entered the company to engage in research and development. In October 2016, I discovered the broad prospects of drones in the field of agricultural plant protection. Zhang Lei joined the focus on industry-level (for plant protection, inspection, security and other fields) drone intelligent flight control platform.

However, the problems of scene adaptability, after-sales guarantee, and endurance time have limited the development of industry-class drones to some extent. Industry insiders analyzed that the industry drones have not laid a solid foundation in terms of technology and market. Although the prospects are promising, before the outbreak of commercial value, enterprises and capital need to go through the time.

The drone enters the public eye and comes from the show of "Where Dad Goes" and other variety shows. In February 2015, the singer Wang Feng’s news on Zhang Ziyi’s birthday party using a drone to send a wedding ring was even more attractive. The eyes of ordinary people.

Since 2015, as consumer-grade multi-rotor drone technology has become more mature, its price has been “close to the people”. A high-definition aerial drone can be purchased at around 3,000 yuan, which can fly up to 500 meters.

It was also this year that the rise of the UAV drone in Shenzhen led to the outbreak of the consumer drone industry. For a time, the influx of people and the influx of capital. "As long as you write a 'UAV' on your business plan, you can get the angel wheel almost without knowing the technology or the team." An industry insider described the investment boom.

According to the application field, civil drones include two categories, consumer and industry. Among them, the industry-level (also known as industrial or commercial) can be applied to agriculture, forestry plant protection, power line inspection, oil pipeline inspection, logistics express, medical rescue and many other scenarios, and the most current application scenarios for consumer-grade drones are Everyone is familiar with aerial photography and entertainment.

“Starting in 2014, I think the industry is running a bit too fast.” From research and development to entrepreneurship to sales, Zhang Lei, who has run the entire drone chain, has a faster sense of smell than the market.

This drone wave is more reflected in the school of technology source. Zhang Wei, the director of the capital operation of Beihang, who came from Beihang, returned to his alma mater and found that the school brothers and sisters’ entrepreneurial competition “had to wait halfway to be a drone. ”

When Zhang Lei left the zero-key control to start a business, he built a team of three or four people, which is equivalent to a team that the big company went out to work. "Going out for almost half a year, I found this thing not as simple as I thought." "There was no financing at all." At that time, entrepreneurs like Zhang Lei were not a minority.

Zhao Guocheng, the founder of the newest three-board drone, used the “crazy” to describe the drone market in 2015.

The pace of capital entering the drone market is also accelerating. According to the Civil UAV Market Analysis Report, the risk investment for drone manufacturers and drone application developers has more than doubled in 2014.

In this year, Dajiang completed a $75 million Series B round of financing, with a valuation of $8 billion to $10 billion. According to media reports, in Shenzhen, which has the fastest market experience, there are more than 300 drone companies in Dajiang, with annual sales exceeding 20 billion yuan.

Li Da (pseudonym), a market researcher of a drone association, said to reporters that "in Shenzhen, within one or two hundred meters, you can find a factory that produces all spare parts for drones."

The change occurred at the end of 2016. The continuous entry of a large number of low-cost homogenized drones has made the market more competitive, and the long market return cycle has gradually eroded capital enthusiasm.

The early arrival of the ceiling and the absolute leading position of Dajiang made the consumer-grade drone bubble burst, and the start-ups without core technology and capital blessings suddenly left.

"At least nine of the ten drones on the market are in Dajiang, and other brands of drones can't be bought at all." In Zhang Lei's view, start-ups are simply unable to compete on the consumer-grade track.

At one time, it was still the industry leader, such as zero-degree intelligence control, which was involved in the layoffs at the end of 2016. Several zero-degree old employees recalled that the company’s work from the wind and water to the layoffs was almost overnight.

At that time, Zhang Lei, who was also a zero-degree consumer-grade drone dealer in the field of drones, said that after zero, he retired to the second line and turned to the core algorithm.

Also a star enterprise in the consumer wave, Yihang was photographed in a circle of friends more than a month ago: a banner on the front of the office building reads “Guangzhou Yihang’s loan owed 19 The month has not returned."

"Strategic radicalization, continuous release of new products", "no core technology", "not able to transform in time", many industry insiders summed up the crisis of billion airlines.

In addition to internal worries and “external troubles”, since the second half of 2016, many “black fly” threats to the aviation safety incident have brought a deeper shadow to the consumer-grade drones.

In response to the adverse effects of the UAV "Black Flying", the regulatory policy began to tighten up - the Civil Aviation Administration's Flying Standards Division has issued the "Light and Small UAV Operation Regulations" and "Civil UAV Pilot Management Regulations"; The Airworthiness Department issued the "Interim Provisions on Issues Concerning the Management of Civil UAVs" and the "Regulations on the Registration and Management of Real-name Systems for Civil Unmanned Aerial Vehicles".

In 2016, DJI’s sales in the Chinese market declined slightly. Even in Xinjiang, which has an overwhelming advantage in the field of consumer drones, it has made new thinking on the market and decided to move into various sub-sectors of the industry drone market.

In fact, Dajiang has already begun the layout of industry-class drones. "In the southern power grid inspection line, even if Xinjiang does not account for 80%, 60% is certainly there." An industry source said.

"Today, the number of UAV companies in Shenzhen is around 50, and there may be more than a dozen of them in the consumer class." Li Da told reporters.

Recently, Zhao Hao, the director of Xingyi Capital Investment, has seen many UAV startups BP, but “has never paid attention to the consumption dynamics”. This can be regarded as the epitome of the current trend of investment institutions. The market growth rate is slowing down and the competitiveness of small companies is insufficient. At this stage, Zhao Hao is more optimistic about the development of drones at the industry level.

“After the investment tide, the competition of (UAV) enterprises will be a contest between technical strength, industrial chain management and capital.” Zhao Guocheng expects that more consumer-grade UAV companies will close down or choose to transform in 2018.

“The main reason is that the consumer demand is temporarily weak, and there is a gap between the product experience of consumer drones and the expectations of consumers.” In the view of Zhang Wei, the director of the operation of Xingyi Capital, the consumer-class drones did not cut the real high-frequency needs. The business scenario, the outbreak of industry-class drones may come faster than the consumer level.

In fact, the industry-level track has long since entered the game, and the Yiwate drone has been aimed at the industry level in 2010.

"Unlike the consumer drone market, the industrial drone market is in the blue ocean era." In the view of Yiwate founder Zhao Guocheng, the drone industry has deeper application in various segments and has greater commercial value. And market size. Due to the main focus on the technical performance and industrial application of the aircraft, the industrial-grade market needs to communicate with industry customers repeatedly and improve the program in practice. Therefore, it has strong customer stickiness and barriers.

The shackles of consumer-grade drones also made technical reserves for industrial-grade drones. According to the data of China Intellectual Property Network, from June 2013 to June 2016, the number of national UAV patents has increased significantly in just three years. The five key technologies of the UAV industry – body structure design technology and body materials Technology, flight control technology, wireless communication remote control technology and wireless image back-transmission technology - all have breakthroughs.

And have industry-level drones found a business scenario that really creates value? What can industry-level drones do?

"In addition to having children, you can think of all the industries, drones can be combined." After deep understanding of this industry, you will find that Li Da is not a joke.

In addition to the recently known logistics applications, there have been drones in the fields of agricultural plant protection, power inspection, 3D mapping, security, medical treatment, and anti-drug.

"The impression is deeper than a UAV exercise in a public security bureau some time ago." Li Da said that during the exercise, eight UAV units intercepted the suspects who fled by air through the air-dropping car and transmitted in real time. Back to high definition images and positioning. After the suspect abandoned the car and fled to the dense crowd, the unmanned crew pulled the blocking net and fired the knocking bomb to temporarily deprive the suspect. "Even if it is just an exercise, you can see the broad prospects of drones in the security field." Li Da said with emotion.

In the field of fire protection, the main use of drones today is observation. "Through the infrared camera to find the fire point in the smoke, throwing fire-fighting bombs to control the fire." Li Da said that this is of great significance to forest fires and high-rise buildings with few effective solutions.

In agriculture, recently, the Ministry of Agriculture, the Ministry of Finance and the Civil Aviation Administration issued a notice announcing that in 2017, six provinces and cities including Zhejiang, Anhui, Jiangxi, Hunan, Guangdong and Chongqing will be selected to carry out pilot subsidies for plant protection drones. This means that the plant protection drones that the industry expects for many years will have more room for spraying pesticides, sowing and fertilizing.

The transition to the industry level is almost a consensus reached by the entire circle. How do many companies stand out in this gradual hot blue ocean?

"There must be core technology to serve the drone industry." In the view of Zhao Hao, the investment director of Xingyi Capital, adding artificial intelligence terminals, such as self-determination of hidden dangers during the cruise process, will greatly enhance the capabilities of the entire drone. . The New Third Board UAV Enterprise Code Defense is a good example. As the only UAV anti-drug service provider in China, Guandian Defence has established a system of UAV geographic information database, providing UAV as the carrier's overall service plan for aerial survey, interpretation and ground verification.

In addition to the core technology, the ability to be deeply coupled with the service sector is also considered to be the key to the success of the industry drone. Zhang Wei, director of the operation of Xingyi Capital, believes: "The industrial chain is upstream.

In addition to the core technology, the ability to be deeply coupled with the service sector is also considered to be the key to the success of the industry drone. Zhang Wei, director of operations at Xingyi Capital, believes that “the industry chain is more scalable upstream.” Successful civilian UAV companies need to provide end-to-end, from hardware, software and cloud infrastructure (storage and analysis) to customers. Customized total solution.

Being able to quickly roll out localized after-sales services may be the biggest barrier for future industrial drones. Zhang Lei, who is engaged in sales work at Yifei Zhizhi, knows that the sales of industrial-grade drones are geographically divided. "If the aerial drone is broken, I can send it back to the headquarters for repair. It will be no problem for more than half a month, but if it is a plant protection drone, the cycle of pests and diseases will be only 10 days, and it will take 15 days to send it back to the headquarters for repair. I can't afford it.” Quick response is critical to industry drones.

Based on the localization and after-sales, it is difficult to launch rapidly in the country. Zhang Lei believes that in the short term, industry-level drones will not appear as a single-size situation like the consumer class.

The UAV industry's transition to the industry level seems to be in full swing, but it has not yet experienced exponential growth like the consumer level in 2015, and the overall accumulation stage before the outbreak.

The reason, Zhang Lei believes, is that "investors can't see a more detailed future."

Taking the plant protection drone as an example, before joining the Feizhizhi control, Zhang Lei calculated an account: spraying the pesticide with the drone, the cost per mu is 4 yuan, the income is 20 yuan, one machine per machine can spray 300 to one day. 500 acres of land. "According to this, the profits are very rich."

However, what Zhang Lei did not expect was that the domestic land was not connected to the national conditions, the operational level of the flying hand, and the technical difficulties in the obstacle avoidance, so that the cost advantage of the plant protection drone was almost gone.

Obstacle avoidance is critical to the flight of mainstream drones, but existing solutions are still in the prototype stage. To ensure public safety, there is a need to improve sensors, sensing algorithms, and drone designs. The endurance capacity of about 30 minutes has also become a difficult situation for industry-level drones to be solved in the near future.

After observing the market for two years, Li Da also believes that the industrial-grade scenes have insufficient adaptability. "The big industry has not yet fully opened up." The industrial drones have not yet solidified their foundations in terms of technology and market.

Is the industry-class drone a good business worth investing in? The answer of Sequoia Capital founder Michael Moritz is: "The drone is the trend of the future. After decades, no one is as popular as a train or a car." However, I don't know how many companies can survive the long burning. The cycle does not know how many investors are willing to wait until the day it makes money.

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