Global drones-as-a-service provider, RocketDNA Ltd (ASX: RKT) has received approval from the South African Civil Aviation Authority (SACAA) to operate remote autonomous drone docking solutions.

Approval process: SACAA is the national regulator in South Africa who maintains oversight and provides approval within the civl aviation industry, including commercial drone operations. RocketDNA has undergone a thorough approval process with the SACAA which includes a demonstration at RocketDNA’s remote operating centre in Johannesburg and an assessment of processes including its operations manual.

Approval was received from SACAA for Remote Docking Station Operations using the autonomous Hextronics Global Drone Station, which includes Beyond Visual Line of Sight (BVLOS) flight. RocketDNA is the first company in South Africa to receive approval for the Remote UAS Docking Stations.

RocketDNA products: The approvals allow for RocketDNA to provide its customers with automated operational workflows using drones and AI. RocketDNA has already developed three X-Bot (drone-in-a- box) branded product offerings:

• InspectBot | RocketDNA
• PatrolBot | RocketDNA
• SurveyBot | RocketDNA

Following our very recent approval for our ‘drone-in-a-box’ solution in Australia, we are very pleased to have attained the equivalent in South Africa, where we have a significant footprint of tier-1 and tier-2 customers and expect customer demand for the solution. The process has been arduous, however, it now uniquely positions the business in many ways,” RocketDNA CEO Christopher Clark said.

“We expect similar use cases to Australia in mining and uniquely in South Africa, providing security intelligence for mines against theft who we already service in South Africa using traditional drones, as well as the agriculture sector.

“There is also a huge opportunity to develop new autonomous drone-based use cases around safer and more sustainable work environments, keeping people out of dangerous environments through monitoring intelligence which spans multiple existing and new verticals.

“The culmination of this technology now at a lower price point and in a packaged solution by us into an attractive commercial model, where we lease the system to customers, including hardware, software and maintenance, is expected to open up significant opportunities for us to scale the business now that the SACAA approvals have been received.”