Rich Smith, The Motley Fool
5 min read
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China's DJI owns 70% of the global market for drones -- and 75% of the U.S. market.
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American stealth drone start-up SiFly just introduced two new commercial drones that outclass anything DJI has for sale.
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SiFly is a private company that has not yet IPO'd.
China owns the drone industry -- and DJI particularly so.
According to ResearchAndMarkets.com's "Connected Commercial Drones-1st Edition," published in April, China's DJI holds a "dominant" 70% global market share in drones. WBUR public radio reports that in the U.S., DJI owns a market share of 75%!
But one company wants to change that.
Santa Clara, California-based start-up company SiFly has "ambitions to dethrone Shenzen-based DJI as the global standard in commercial drones," as Newsweek reported last month.
Up until last month, SiFly was a company operating in "stealth mode," avoiding attention and indeed, actively working to keep its existence a secret from the public. But in May, SiFly drew the veil off two new commercial quadcopter drones, the SiFly Q12 and Q250. The smaller Q12 boasts flight endurance of up to three hours, and can carry 10-pound payloads 90 miles before its batteries run out of juice. The larger Q250 can only fly for about half as long -- but carries 20 times the payload.
Nothing DJI has on the market currently can match these numbers -- nor can other companies not named "DJI." At a Michigan drone competition in May, SiFly's Q12 set a record as the longest-flying "delivery quadcopter" in the world. For comparison, DJI's Phantom 4 RTK, not the company's most popular consumer drone but a decent commercial product, can carry 30 pounds for about 30 minutes (over four miles), for a cost of $6,500.
DJI's most capable drone (at any price) appears to be the DJI FlyCart 30, a $20,000 drone that can carry 66-pound payloads about 10 miles, and usually must be special-ordered in the U.S.
Speaking of price, though, how do SiFly's new drones compare? Well, that's a bit of a mystery. With the products so new to the market, no one really knows what SiFly will charge for them. UAVCoach.com estimates an MSRP of "at least $10,000, if not much more," for the Q12. SiFly itself has floated a more aggressive target for the Q250, albeit still vague:
"We aim to be somewhere between the top end of the DJI market and what you see from the other Western suppliers, so we'd be talking about below $100k probably," for the Q250, says SiFly chief business officer Logan Jones.
