Celebrating a Landmark for the AutoSpray Pilot Network
What a month for the AutoSpray Pilot Network! Following the announcement of the ‘Beyond Restoration’ project, we held the UK’s first commercial BVLOS practical flight training course for an advanced group of our pilots earlier this month.
The intensive course was a huge success, with Simon Blakey, Kevin Gornall, James Braid, Steve Harrison and Mark Howard-Smith mastering the theory and facing real-world challenges, including simulated emergency scenarios, to gain their vital BVLOS skills. A huge thank you to this first group of five certified pilots: you are paving the way for the future of commercial drone operations in the UK!
We’ll be running the second BVLOS training course next month. If you are interested in joining a future session and learning more about how you can participate in ground-breaking projects like ‘Beyond Restoration,’ please get in touch.
Agri-Tech Frontiers: ARPAS-UK Series Kick-Off
We were proud to partner with ARPAS-UK to launch the ‘Agri-Tech Frontiers‘ webinar series earlier this month. The first session, From Training to Transformation, served as a powerful launchpad for Beyond Restoration, and you can watch the full thing here.
We hope that these webinars will provide plenty of valuable content for AutoSpray pilots looking to stay ahead of the curve. The series continues on6th November with The Commercial Imperative: Net Risk, Picking Winners, and Nurturing Agri-Tech, exploring how drones can drive safer, smarter, and more scalable innovation across UK agriculture.
In the News: Frazer Bloor on BBC
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Leading the Dialogue: PwC and Drone X
We underlined our position this month as industry leaders both in the field and in policy dialogue:
- Recognised by PwC for the Second Time: AutoSpray has been cited for the second time in PwC’s annual drone report. This year’s paper, ‘UK Drone Regulations and Net Risk,’ is a landmark report that highlights the government’s growing focus on ‘picking winners’ and notes crop spraying and seeding as a high-benefit, low-risk BVLOS use case that is ready to scale.
- Andy Speaks at Drone X: Andy Sproson spoke on the UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) panel last month at Drone X Tradeshow and Conference. He shared advice and insights on ‘Accelerating the adoption of Future Flight technologies,’ focusing on the transformative potential of BVLOS, particularly for public service organisations and conservation at scale.
Business Fundamentals Course
As you start to look ahead and plan your projects and pricing for next year’s season, now is the perfect time to sharpen your business skills.
To help the AutoSpray pilots build profitable and sustainable businesses, Rob will be joined by Peter Johnson from QRS for a webinar and Q&A on 29th October 12:30-1:30pm.
The session will cover business fundamentals including pricing, quoting, sales, and marketing, giving you the practical knowledge needed to secure and successfully manage commercial work.