Microdrones Unveils New High-Resolution LiDAR Survey Platform

Microdrones has unveiled the latest in its range of UAV (unmanned aerial vehicle)-based LiDAR surveying systems, the mdLiDAR1000HR aaS. The new system is available as part of the Microdrones as a Service (mdaaS) program, which provides convenient monthly payment options for both drone equipment and software.

The mdLiDAR1000HR aaS is ideal for a wide range of professional geospatial applications, such as corridor mapping, forestry, stockpile volume calculation, construction and more. Incorporating Velodyne’s lightweight high-resolution Puck sensor, it is a fully integrated system for producing 3D point clouds.

Vivien Heriard-Dubreuil, CEO of Microdrones, commented: “We have had such a positive response to our new mdaaS program, we wanted to provide our customers another option at the mid-range price point for drone based LiDAR. That’s why we enhanced our mdLiDAR1000 aaS system with the new mdLiDAR1000HR aaS. What does the HR stand for? Quite simply: high resolution.”

Dr. Nicolas Seube, Director of R&D for the Microdrones sister software company, mdInfinity, said: “The Microdrones mdLiDAR1000HR aaS precision was analyzed by flights between 30 and 60 meters over a wide sample of surfaces (asphalt, gravel, roofs, natural ground) exhibiting different reflectance. This drone LiDAR system, with a 90 degree field of view for both scanned points and imagery, repeatedly provides a precision of 1.6 cm (.052 ft) at 1-σ when flown at 40 m (130 ft) at a speed of 8 m/s (18 mph). This was confirmed by a repeatability analysis.”

Robert Chrismon, Microdrones Marketing Manager, stated: “Overall, I was very impressed with the data produced by the new mdLiDAR1000HR aaS, and excited to see the resolution improvement over the mdLiDAR1000 aaS. With the additional point density, greater resolution, and higher accuracy over the previous mdLiDAR1000 aaS, we start to close the gap on the mdLiDAR3000 aaS. This will allow more of the surveying community access to a quality UAV LiDAR solution.”

Frank Darmayan, Microdrones COO, added: “We worked with LiDAR innovator Velodyne to seamlessly integrate their Puck Lite sensor. It’s lightweight, it offers increased range as well as field of view. When you combine that with our complete package of software, workflow, service and support, you have a turnkey drone lidar system that improves your field data collection and data processing productivity on day one… and surveyors can choose easy monthly payments or traditional purchasing options… whatever works best for them.”

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