The Mayor of the West Midlands has been given a sneak peek at how advanced drone technology could soon be making vital medical deliveries thanks to a Coventry company.
Andy Street was invited along to a secret location in Warwickshire to see how local firm, Skyfarer, is planning to revolutionise the way critical supplies, such as organs for transplant, can be transported via drone.
The company was established in 2017 by Elliot Parnham, who initially planned to manufacture drones but then pivoted to use existing technology for the transportation of medical items.
Over the years, he has been supported by a range of organisations in the region including the University of Warwick Science Park.
Skyfarer is now in the process of running trials to prove the technology and invited the regional mayor, representatives from West Midlands Police and the Birmingham Transplant Sports Team to see the drones in action.
Elliot said: “We brought together three different stakeholders who all have their own perspectives and are all involved, in their own way, in what we are trying to achieve here in the UK.
“When you look at the perspective from the Birmingham Transplant Sports Team, this technology could have been used to deliver the organs when they had their operations. This could be the future and sometimes seeing is believing.
“So, it was great to be able to showcase what we can do and how we could transform the way critical supplies are delivered. It was really uplifting. As well as being faster, it also has massive environmental benefits too because it cuts down on road journeys.”
Andy Bright, who has had a double lung transplant, said: “I can only imagine what it would have been like to know that my new lungs had been delivered by drone!
“This is now science fact, not science fiction!”
The next stage for Skyfarer is to run ‘beyond visual line of sight’ trials to further prove the technology.
Andy Street, Mayor of the West Midlands, said: “It was great to see a Skyfarer drone in action and to see up close the practical application of this technology and how it can have a genuinely life-saving impact here in our region. I have great confidence in what Skyfarer can achieve having seen what they can do with my own eyes. The evidence is clearly now there for them to move on to the next stage in their development. I look forward to seeing their progress.”
Pictured (left to right): Paul Davis, Andy Street, Elliot Parnham, Georgia Hanrahan and Keith Bennett.