Seattle-based Clean-tech Startup is the Only Company with Both 107MV and 137 Waivers

SEATTLE, May 16, 2017 — (PRNewswire) —

SEATTLE, May 16, 2017 /PRNewswire-iReach/ -- Clean tech startup DroneSeed is the first company approved by the Federal Aviation Administration for delivering agricultural payloads with multiple drones, after passing several regulatory milestones.  DroneSeed provides precision forestry services to timber companies and non-profits. On April 25th, 2017, DroneSeed hosted a FAA visit at a Washington state site to pass a knowledge and skills test that certified their aircraft and pilot. The FAA test was pioneered for DroneSeed and their pilot was the the first to ever pass it.

VP Operations Logan Ullyott, the pilot who was the first to ever pass the FAA test, said, "We have been conscientious about regulation since day 1. The FAA was very supportive of DroneSeed and we are grateful for their help. They are keenly interested in how drones reduce risk in agricultural operations."

Upon passing the FAA test, DroneSeed became the first company in the US approved to use drone swarms to spray agricultural payloads ( fertilizers, herbicides, and water). No other company in the US has both a 107 waiver for multi-vehicle and a 137 exemption for spraying.  Being the first company with both waivers uniquely positions DroneSeed for forestry and agricultural contracts in 2018 and beyond.  CEO Grant Canary says, "With our singular status, DroneSeed is excited to start serving our forestry customers. We've already booked out our capacity for this summer and are now looking at fall. We have all been waiting for and working towards this exciting milestone."

Though reforestation is a $62 billion industry, tree planting techniques have not changed in 100 years: trees are still planted by work crews with shovels, a slow, expensive, and grueling process in which recruiting labor is a challenge. When asked about why the team launched the business, CEO and co-founder Grant Canary commented, "Trees are the best resource we have to reduce atmospheric CO2. By introducing technology, we make reforestation scalable and play a role in reversing climate change. The only reason forestry didn't automate sooner was the terrain and precision required. Drones have no issues with terrain but have only become viable in the last few years. DroneSeed is making reforestation a scaleable process for both timber companies and wildfire and rainforest sites in the near future." The National Institute for Fire Control recorded approximately 9.5M acres burned in the US in 2016. For comparison, the largest private forestry company in the US owns approximately 13M acres.

If you'd like to see DroneSeed in action, watch the first-ever footage of a drone planting a tree at here: https://vimeo.com/droneseed/treeplantingdrones

Or listen to Ian Smith of DroneDeploy interview them on CommercialDrones.fm (29min). 

About DroneSeed

DroneSeed offers full lifecycle services for forestry management by using an efficient, cost-competitive fleet of drones to reduce reliance on manual labor.

Founded in 2015 by eco-tech startup veteran Grant Canary, CTO Jeff Prouty and VP Operations Logan Ullyott, DroneSeed first won the Beaverton, Oregon $100K Challenge sponsored by the City of Beaverton and Oregon Technology and Business Center. Shortly after, they were one of the nine startups selected for Techstars Seattle 2016 out of over 1,000 applicants to the program. Currently, DroneSeed has signed  services contracts with several large private timber companies as well as a watershed restoration project with Portland water utility Clean Water Services (link: http://www.geekwire.com/2016/droneseed/).

Media Contact: Lauren Kozak, DroneSeed, 6304841292, Email Contact

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SOURCE DroneSeed