ACSL Ltd. (Edogawa Ward, Tokyo; Satoshi Washiya, President, hereafter ACSL) conducted demonstrations of its domestically produced drone “SOTEN” for several customers, including General Pacific, Inc. in anticipation of entering the U.S. market, which is the largest drone markets in the world, and received a high evaluation.

ACSL states that its goal is to become a sustainable global manufacturer and is actively promoting expansion into overseas markets in its mid-term management plan “ACSL Accelerate FY22” announced on January 28, 2022.
ACSL estimates that the U.S. drone market is already exceeds $11 billion, but roughly half is military, with industrial use limited to about 30%. Although major Chinese manufacturers have held majority market share in the past, the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) ban on procurement of Chinese drones for national defense purposes in 2020 has attracted the attention of Western manufacturers in the civilian market.

In such an environment, when ACSL exhibited at the Commercial UAV Expo held in Las Vegas from September 6~8, 2022, the ACSL SOTEN small aerial photography drone attracted the interest of many U.S. companies, partly because of its high security features that prevent data leakage and extraction and resistance to aircraft hijacking, which meets economic security needs.
Among potential uses, there is a particular interest in the use of drones for infrastructure inspection, and there were requests several requests from potential US customers to confirm the actual flight performance of the drones and the quality of the images taken, which led ACSL to conduct the demonstration announced here.

■Demonstrations

One of the potential customers visited, General Pacific, is a distributor of utilities goods for public utilities companies. In addition to selling drones for utilities infrastructure inspection, they also offer drone pilot and operations training, and have branched into distribution of drones to public safety entities. General Pacific became interested in SOTEN at the Commercial UAV Expo and conducted a demonstration to consider selling SOTEN in the US.
Through demonstrations at multiple customer sites, ACSL was received a high evaluation of the system’s practical applicability, such as for actual infrastructure inspections, and was able to confirm willingness of the potential customers to purchase the system.

ACSL will continue to actively disseminate information and communicate with customers with aim to enter the U.S. market in order to become a sustainable global manufacturer.

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