Market Overview

Drones are those unmanned aircrafts that do not structurally allow human on board and are able to fly by remote-control or autonomous operations. Overseas, these are also called Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV) or Unmanned Aircraft System (UAS) that is the combination of UAV and Ground Control Station (GCS) that controls UAV.
Since around the year 2000, startups emerged for drone development in China, Europe, and the United States, supplying high-performance and high-priced drones worldwide. Japan, too, has seen establishment of drone makers in the same period. The global market size of industrial drones by the sales amount at manufacturers is projected to attain 318,694 million yen. Drone business is likely to grow furthermore to expand the market, as business has been established for many industrial applications.

Noteworthy Topics

Disaster Response Drones Targeted for “Urgent Disaster-Prevention/Mitigation Bond”

Drones in Japan already have extensive industrial applications such as in the industry of agriculture, forestry, and fishery, or for inspections, measurement, security and monitoring. One of growth areas expected hereafter is disaster response.
According to the Fire and Disaster Management Agency of Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications, 60% of firefighting headquarters nationwide have deployed drones as of April 2022. In FY2022, “Urgent Disaster-Prevention/Mitigation Bond” has newly targeted the procurement expense for disaster response drones. This is followed by the allocation of 500 billion yen in the local finance plan for FY2023 for underwater drone deployment at firefighting headquarters added to the support on efforts to improve living environment in designated evacuation shelters.
Because the full-scale deployment has been planned after FY2024, drone makers are making efforts on obtaining UAS Type Certification, indispensable for disaster response drones, repeated research and development, and improved awareness among citizens. 

Future Outlook

Just like existing mobilities such as automobiles and passenger aircrafts, drones are seeing legislations as well as improved environment for their handling worldwide. Hereafter, the steady market expansion is expected, because of high safety and extensive industrial applications highly appreciated. Demand for drones is projected to increase furthermore, as the implementation stage being shifted from demonstrations at each industry in Japan, just as those stages are witnessed in China, Europe, and the US. The global industrial drone market expects growth to 1,412,421 million yen by 2030.

Research Outline