The drone economy is about to take off fast: A $355B market and new rule could make drones-as-a-service the next big thing

In an interview between Federal Drive host Terry Gerton and James McDanolds, Program Chair at Sonoran Desert Institute’s School of Uncrewed Technology, the conversation argues the drone economy is about to shift because of operations economics, not airframe innovation. The key catalyst is Part 108, a proposed FAA and TSA rule that would standardize beyond visual line of sight flights and allow one operator to supervise multiple drones, moving today’s waiver-only experiments toward a national baseline. That unlocks “drones-as-a-service” models like drone-in-a-box systems where aircraft stay staged on site, powered and connected 24/7, and are flown remotely on demand across many locations. McDanolds notes the operator role becomes closer to an air traffic controller, while scale brings heavier requirements around airspace integration, safety site surveys, and Remote ID-based identification. He also argues the real bottleneck is talent, both multi-drone operators and domestic builders, as the industry shifts toward more US-based manufacturing and component supply chains.

Major Takeaway: Part 108 could turn drones from “one pilot, one aircraft” into a scalable network business, making drones-as-a-service viable at real margins, but the winners will be the ones who can pair regulatory unlocks with operational discipline, safety integration, and a workforce that can run autonomy at scale. Read More

Portugal builds Europe’s first dedicated drone carrier, D João II

Portugal is building what it describes as Europe’s first dedicated drone carrier, the 107.6-metre NRPD João II, a modular naval platform built to operate unmanned aerial, surface, and underwater systems. The €132 million ship is being built by Damen in Galați, Romania, largely funded by EU recovery funds, and is scheduled for delivery in the second half of 2026. The core design is flexibility: the Navy says it can swap equipment and shift mission profiles within about a week, supporting everything from environmental monitoring and oceanographic data collection to search and rescue, disaster response, maritime surveillance, and evacuations. The article also frames it as a response to Portugal’s massive maritime jurisdiction and rising hybrid-threat concerns, especially around undersea infrastructure, while acknowledging that command and control for dispersed unmanned fleets is technically demanding. The ship is designed around open systems so it can integrate emerging technologies like AI over time, always with human supervision.

Major Takeaway: Portugal is betting that a modular, drone-first ship can deliver more operational reach per euro than traditional platforms, blending science, surveillance, and security missions into one reconfigurable carrier built around unmanned scale and rapid mission switching. Read More

Revolution Drones and Exedy Drones target US ag spray drone market as FCC rewrites the rules

AgFunderNews describes a US ag spray drone market being reshaped by the FCC’s December move that blocks authorization for new foreign-made drone models and critical components, forcing a scramble to build and scale domestic alternatives. Exedy Drones, backed by automotive supplier EXEDY Globalparts, is repurposing Michigan manufacturing capacity and aiming to increase US content over time, while calling batteries, motors, and controllers key near-term constraints. Revolution Drones, founded by North Carolina farmer Russell Hedrick, is stitching together a multi-state domestic supply chain and says it has already sold about 250 units with near-term production ramps planned, even as some motors, radar, and battery components remain difficult to localize without major cost increases. Market data shows the tension: acreage sprayed by drones grew 58.7% to 16.4 million acres in 2025, but new drone sales fell 59% as DJI imports were disrupted, and price per acre dropped from $21 to $13 amid aggressive competition and undercutting by non-Part 137 operators. The piece notes that existing FCC-authorized foreign drones remain legal for now, exemptions exist through 2027 for certain categories, and covered manufacturers’ previously authorized drones can still receive firmware and software updates through at least January 1, 2027, but new platform authorizations are the long-term choke point.

Major Takeaway: US ag spray drones are growing in real usage while the supply chain and regulatory stack is rewriting who gets to sell the next generation, and the near-term winners will be the companies that can reliably manufacture, service, and keep parts flowing under the new FCC framework, not just build a competitive airframe. Read More

About Lucid Bots

Founded in 2018, Lucid Bots is an AI robotics company that is committed to uplifting humanity by building the world's most productive and responsible robots that can do dangerous and demanding tasks.

Headquartered in Charlotte, the company engineers, manufactures, and supports its products domestically, which include the Sherpa, a cleaning drone, and the Lavo, a pressure-washing robot.

Lucid Bots' products are elevating safety and efficiency for a growing number of customers around the world. Lucid is a Y Combinator-backed company, with investments from Cubit Capital, Idea Fund Partners, Danu Ventures, and others. Lucid Bots was recently recognized as the fastest growing robotics manufacturer in the United States.

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Zipline to Expand Drone Delivery to Houston, Phoenix With $600M Raise

Zipline is gearing up for a major U.S. expansion in 2026, announcing plans to bring its home drone delivery service to Houston and Phoenix in early 2026 and to enter at least four new states by the end of the year. The move is backed by a fresh $600 million raise and comes alongside a milestone the company is using as proof of momentum: more than 2 million global deliveries since launching in 2016, which Zipline claims is greater than all other drone delivery providers combined, with Wing cited at just over half a million trips. Operationally, Zipline is leaning into regulatory and tech credibility to frame this as real infrastructure, not a pilot. It holds FAA Part 135 certification (2023) and received authorization to begin BVLOS operations (2024), and it has been pioneering UTM-enabled operations with Walmart in Dallas Fort Worth. The company also highlighted how quickly adoption is accelerating in DFW, with new sites reportedly hitting 100 daily deliveries in as little as two days, and positioned its two-platform approach as a scale play. Platform 1 handles longer-range deliveries, while Platform 2 focuses on neighborhood-style home delivery that can reposition between docks based on demand. Zipline says it is now valued at $7.6B, has flown 125 million autonomous commercial miles, and is expanding manufacturing capacity to support production of up to 15,000 drones per year, signaling it expects demand and deployment to keep compounding.

Major Takeaway: Zipline is betting that drone delivery has crossed the novelty threshold in the U.S., and with fresh capital, regulatory progress, and accelerating repeat usage, it is pushing to make autonomous logistics feel like an everyday utility across multiple states in 2026. Read More

OU Research Team Testing Drone Technology to Improve Weather Forecasting

A University of Oklahoma team is putting drones to work in a very specific gap in U.S. weather observing: the atmospheric boundary layer, where small changes can quickly turn into big forecasting misses. Through a new effort called the 3D Mesonet, researchers are flying instrumented drones from existing Oklahoma Mesonet sites to capture more frequent, more localized vertical profiles than traditional tools like weather balloons, which typically only launch twice a day. Backed by a contract from NOAA’s National Mesonet Program, the Oklahoma Climatological Survey is using the CopterSonde-SWX platform in weekly flights at the Kessler Atmospheric and Ecological Field Station, with a goal of ramping up to hourly launches through early April. The point is simple and high impact: more real-time boundary layer data could sharpen short-term forecasts for thunderstorms, severe winds, and winter precipitation types, especially in situations where the timing and location of storm initiation, or a narrow temperature shift that decides sleet versus freezing rain, really matters. The team is already sending test flight data to the National Weather Service, and OU is positioning Oklahoma as the first state to deliver these kinds of drone-based profiles through the National Mesonet Program. Longer term, they want to push toward multi-site operations that do not require a pilot and observer on site, moving the system closer to the always-on feel of the Mesonet’s automated towers.

Major Takeaway: The 3D Mesonet is a clear step toward making drone-based atmospheric profiling a practical forecasting input, turning boundary layer measurements from “nice to have” research data into a higher-frequency signal that could meaningfully improve short-term, high-stakes weather prediction. Read More

Nvidia’s Jensen Huang says AI robotics is a ‘once-in-a-generation’ opportunity for Europe

Jensen Huang used Davos to make a very direct pitch to Europe: the region’s biggest advantage in the next AI wave is not software, it is factories. His argument is that Europe already has an unusually strong industrial and manufacturing base, and the real unlock is fusing that capability with modern AI to create what he called “physical AI,” meaning autonomous robotics that can operate in the real world. In his framing, this is a chance for Europe to leap past the software era that has been dominated by the U.S. and define the next platform shift through machines that build, move, and do work. The momentum is already building. European industrial giants like Siemens, Mercedes-Benz, Volvo, and Schaeffler have been announcing new robotics projects and partnerships, while U.S. Big Tech has been doubling down too, with moves like Tesla’s heavy Optimus push, DeepMind publishing robotics-focused AI models, and Nvidia partnering with Alphabet on physical AI.  The constraint, Huang said, is not imagination, it is infrastructure. Specifically, Europe needs to get serious about energy supply and costs if it wants to support the AI compute buildout required for this shift, because the “infrastructure layer” is where AI ecosystems are won or lost, and the broader AI buildout is still early compared to what is coming.

Major Takeaway: Huang is positioning AI robotics as Europe’s best shot at leading the next tech platform shift, but the message comes with a hard requirement that without major energy and infrastructure investment, Europe risks having the industrial talent and demand while missing the compute foundation needed to scale it. Read more

About Lucid Bots

Founded in 2018, Lucid Bots is an AI robotics company that is committed to uplifting humanity by building the world's most productive and responsible robots that can do dangerous and demanding tasks.

Headquartered in Charlotte, the company engineers, manufactures, and supports its products domestically, which include the Sherpa, a cleaning drone, and the Lavo, a pressure-washing robot.

Lucid Bots' products are elevating safety and efficiency for a growing number of customers around the world. Lucid is a Y Combinator-backed company, with investments from Cubit Capital, Idea Fund Partners, Danu Ventures, and others. Lucid Bots was recently recognized as the fastest growing robotics manufacturer in the United States.

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The robots we saw at CES 2026: The lovable, the creepy and the utterly confusing

CES has always been a magnet for attention-grabbing robots, but Engadget framed 2026 as a real inflection point. With AI materially improving robot “brains” and autonomy, the show moved beyond novelty and leaned into systems that can actually do more on their own. Humanoids were front and center: Agibot’s lineup stood out, with the smaller X2 learning complex choreography and the larger A2 holding real conversations while actively operating booths. On the consumer side, robotics stretched past the standard vacuum demos. Dreame showed a multipurpose extendable arm capable of picking up objects and cleaning corners, along with a stair-climbing concept that handled full-size steps. Roborock introduced its own stair-climbing vacuum concept, while LG’s CLOiD ran an extended demo folding laundry, fetching drinks, and assisting in the kitchen, impressive, even if still conceptual. AI companions were everywhere as well, from Sharp’s Poketomo to Takway’s Sweekar pocket pet and Ludens AI’s Cocomo. At the other end of the spectrum, Realbotix leaned into realism, showcasing humanoids with facial tracking and expression-reading vision tech that many found unsettling.

Major Takeaway: CES 2026 made it clear that robotics is accelerating quickly, with more autonomy and a broader range of form factors, but also highlighted the tension between practical, value-driving machines and human-like robots that still feel difficult to trust. Read More

Robotics market projected to reach US$ 199.50 billion by 2035

A new market outlook from Astute Analytica projects the global robotics market will grow from $51.51 billion in 2025 to $199.50 billion by 2035, driven by sustained investment and clear industrial demand. The report argues robotics has moved beyond pilots and demos into core operational infrastructure, powered by embodied AI and use cases that are increasingly non-optional for companies. It highlights rapid industrial expansion, noting that the operational stock of industrial robots reached roughly 4.7 million units with 9% year-over-year growth, and that China accounted for 54% of global robot supply. Hardware represents the largest share of the market at 44.7%, while industrial robots remain the dominant category at 35.5%, led by manufacturing use cases such as welding, painting, and assembly. The outlook also points to growing deployments in logistics and healthcare, and ties future growth to the convergence of generative AI with humanoid platforms capable of more complex work.

Major Takeaway: Robotics is increasingly being treated as critical infrastructure, not experimentation, driven by industrial demand, hardware-heavy economics, and the next wave of embodied AI expanding what robots can realistically handle. Read More

Walmart expands drone delivery with Wing to 150 more stores

Wing is significantly expanding its Walmart drone delivery operations, adding service to 150 more U.S. stores and extending coverage from Los Angeles to Miami. Axios notes that what once sounded futuristic is already routine for some customers, with certain Dallas users ordering Wing drone deliveries multiple times per week. Walmart and Wing project that by the end of 2026, roughly 40 million Americans could have access to the service, with upcoming metro launches planned for Los Angeles, St. Louis, Cincinnati, and Miami. The operating model is designed for scale and repeatability: customers order through Wing’s app, items are packed into a small basket, loaded into a fenced parking-lot “nest,” and flown autonomously while human pilots oversee flights from a centralized hub. Deliveries are currently free as Wing prioritizes adoption, with plans to integrate the service directly into Walmart’s app as the network grows toward more than 270 locations by 2027.

Major Takeaway: Walmart and Wing are pushing drone delivery toward the mainstream by scaling aggressively, standardizing operations, and betting that speed and convenience for everyday essentials will drive consistent, repeat usage. Read More

About Lucid Bots

Founded in 2018, Lucid Bots is an AI robotics company that is committed to uplifting humanity by building the world's most productive and responsible robots that can do dangerous and demanding tasks.

Headquartered in Charlotte, the company engineers, manufactures, and supports its products domestically, which include the Sherpa, a cleaning drone, and the Lavo, a pressure-washing robot.

Lucid Bots' products are elevating safety and efficiency for a growing number of customers around the world. Lucid is a Y Combinator-backed company, with investments from Cubit Capital, Idea Fund Partners, Danu Ventures, and others. Lucid Bots was recently recognized as the fastest growing robotics manufacturer in the United States.

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Drone startups set sights on sustained growth in 2026

Drone startups are heading into 2026 expecting steadier growth as the industry moves beyond experimentation and into repeatable commercial deployments. Founders say the next phase will be defined less by pilots and more by long-term contracts, performance at scale, and reliable operations across real job sites. Clearer regulations and increased demand for domestically produced systems have helped reduce uncertainty and attract new investment. While defense remains a key driver, companies serving agriculture, infrastructure, logistics, and commercial cleaning and inspection are also positioning themselves for broader adoption by offering bundled hardware, software, and services designed for professional use.

Major Takeaway: Drone startups are shifting from early trials to commercial traction, with growth increasingly tied to reliability, long-term customer relationships, and real-world applications such as industrial facility operations and commercial services in 2026. Read More

FCC foreign drone ban could impact U.S. farmers

The Federal Communications Commission has placed new restrictions on foreign-made drones and components, effectively blocking many new models from being authorized for sale or import in the United States. The move, driven by national security concerns, means drones that dominate agriculture and commercial facility operations may no longer be available unless approved by U.S. security agencies. Farmers and industry groups warn the timing could be difficult, as many rely on drones for precision spraying, mapping, crop monitoring, and other automated workflows. While drones already in use remain legal, limited replacement options could increase costs and uncertainty for operators who depend on drones as core infrastructure.

Major Takeaway: A security-driven policy shift is colliding with industries that rely on drones as essential tools, including agriculture and commercial operations. The ruling highlights how urgently domestic manufacturing must scale to support precision farming and other professional drone use cases. Read More

NVIDIA releases new physical AI models as global partners unveil next-generation robots

At CES 2026 in Las Vegas, NVIDIA announced a major expansion of its physical_toggle AI stack, unveiling open models, frameworks, and tools designed to accelerate how robots perceive and act in the real world. The company released new open-source models like Cosmos and GR00T to support world understanding and task execution, along with simulation tools that shorten the path from research to deployment. Global partners including Boston Dynamics, Caterpillar, Franka Robotics, and others demonstrated next-generation machines spanning humanoids, industrial robots, and autonomous systems built for factories, warehouses, and industrial facility operations. NVIDIA also introduced new edge hardware designed to support high-performance robotics in environments where reliability and uptime matter.

Major Takeaway: NVIDIA is helping push robotics toward real-world deployment at scale. By combining physical AI, simulation, and edge computing, the company is accelerating adoption in industries that depend on automation for industrial cleaning, inspection, logistics, and facility operations. Read More

About Lucid Bots

Founded in 2018, Lucid Bots is an AI robotics company that is committed to uplifting humanity by building the world's most productive and responsible robots that can do dangerous and demanding tasks.

Headquartered in Charlotte, the company engineers, manufactures, and supports its products domestically, which include the Sherpa, a cleaning drone, and the Lavo, a pressure-washing robot.

Lucid Bots' products are elevating safety and efficiency for a growing number of customers around the world. Lucid is a Y Combinator-backed company, with investments from Cubit Capital, Idea Fund Partners, Danu Ventures, and others. Lucid Bots was recently recognized as the fastest growing robotics manufacturer in the United States.

Lucid Bots builds U.S-made robots for dirty, dangerous cleaning work. 

On a recent exterior cleaning job, Sherpa Drone stayed in the air for 1 hour and 53 seconds of continuous cleaning at 3,500 PSI and 8 GPM.

No battery swaps.
No landing every few passes.
Just steady exterior cleaning at height while the crew stayed on the ground.

Our CEO, Andrew Ashur, put it simply: this was the longest commercial drone cleaning flight we’ve ever seen – and a big step toward making drones a true all-day tool on real jobsites.

Why this flight matters

Until now, drone cleaning has been limited by batteries.

A typical day with Sherpa Drone looks like:

• Clean for 10–20 minutes
• Land
• Swap batteries
• Take off, line up again
• Repeat

It works, but you lose time and rhythm on every swap. Jobs get planned around chargers and packs instead of just buildings, water, and crew.

With our new power tether, that equation changes.

By feeding power from the ground, it gives Sherpa Drone effectively unlimited flight time: the practical limit on a job is no longer at the fault of the drone batteries. Limitations become things like crew endurance, site scheduling, generator fuel, etc. rather than remaining battery capacity. We’re not removing constraints entirely, but we are moving them off the drone’s batteries.

On this record flight, the drone didn’t come down because the battery was dead. It came down because the section of work was done.

That’s the shift we care about.

What actually happened on the job

This wasn’t a lab test or a parking-lot demo. It was a live exterior cleaning job with all the usual constraints.

On this flight:

• Mode: High-pressure exterior cleaning at height
• Runtime: 1 hour, 53 seconds of effectively continuous work
• Pressure / flow: 3,500 PSI, 8 GPM
• Crew: Operators stayed safely on the ground

Sherpa Drone handled every pass on the wall. The crew focused on:

• Managing hoses and water supply
• Watching for quality of clean
• Keeping eyes on the site, not on battery timers

Under the hood, we paired the power tether with updated onboard power electronics designed for long flights. From the operator’s point of view, though, it felt simple:

“It just stayed up and kept cleaning.”

That’s the experience we’re building toward.

What this unlocks for operators

For contractors, facility managers, and building service companies, this milestone shows up in a few concrete ways.

1. More work per crew per day
With no battery swaps, more of the day is actual cleaning. Sherpa Drone becomes an all-day workhorse for glass, facades, and other exterior surfaces at height.

2. Less time in lifts
Sherpa Drone does the work at height so crews can stay safely on the ground. That means:

• Fewer lifts to rent, move, and maintain
• Fewer people working on edges, roofs, or swing stages

3. Simpler planning
Instead of planning around chargers and packs, you plan around:

• Water
• Generator fuel
• Crew schedules

In other words, the things you already think about on a pressure washing job.

What’s next

This was Lucid’s first and longest exterior cleaning jobsite flight with the power tether. It’s a milestone, not the finish line.

From here, our team is focused on:

• Repeating long-duration flights on more buildings and surfaces
• Gathering real-world feedback from operators
• Making the power tether available to more Sherpa Drone customers

We automate the ordinary, so humans can do the extraordinary.

If you want fewer people in lifts and more work done from the ground, talk with our team about using Sherpa Drone with the power tether on your next job.

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A New Era of Autonomous Cleaning: Lavo AI

Lavo Bot AI brings enterprise-grade autonomy to one of the most demanding exterior maintenance tasks. Using Click-and-Clean™ job templates powered by Lucid OS™, operators can set up, save, and repeat complex cleaning routes with only a few taps, eliminating hours of manual prep work.

With advanced mapping, full-environment sensing, and powered by NVIDIA edge compute, Lavo Bot AI navigates real facilities with confidence and delivers consistent, high-quality cleaning at scale. This is autonomy designed for real job sites, not just controlled environments.

The system can clean up to 6,000 square feet per hour and integrates with commercial pressure washing rigs up to 20 GPM and 4,500 PSI. Early adopters are already seeing what it means to unlock more output without adding more headcount.

Why it matters

Facility teams are being asked to do more with fewer people as the United States janitorial and building maintenance market reaches ~$108B. Labor shortages continue to grow, service expectations are rising, and operators are under pressure to maintain cleaner, safer exterior environments while also reducing costs. Within this market, exterior surface cleaning alone represents $15 to $22B  dollars in recurring annual work, most of which is still performed manually.

Despite the size of the industry, autonomous systems account for well under one percent of all surface cleaning operations today. Most facilities rely on slow and physically demanding manual workflows that limit throughput and make scheduling unpredictable. Lavo Bot AI gives operators an immediate path to higher productivity, consistent quality, and more reliable service delivery. The robot augments crews rather than replacing them and allows existing teams to cover significantly more ground with far less strain, making exterior maintenance more scalable and cost effective.

How It Works

Lavo Bot AI uses the latest NVIDIA edge compute platform to power its autonomy, vision systems, and mapping intelligence. These capabilities allow the robot to move safely through real-world environments and produce enterprise-grade results.

Key capabilities include:

• Autonomy that lasts. Operators can save job areas and rerun them with precise route memory on a recurring schedule.
• Safety for active job sites. Multi-sensor vision systems and zone-based geofencing support safe operation around people and equipment.
• Purpose-built durability. The robot can handle long hose runs and challenging outdoor conditions including grime, gum, grease, and inconsistent surface textures.

Customer perspective

"You recover the investment in just a couple of months," said Francisco Oliveras, owner of PWR Wash PR. "With this approach, you can reduce operating expenses by 40% or more." 

Availability

Limited pilot programs begin this winter, with general availability planned for Q2 2026. Pre‑orders open today. Live demo events are scheduled for January. 

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