Flock

SAM IS ....
Ground-breaking drone delivery trial to be hosted at Montrose Port

A UK-first proof of concept trial for the delivery of medical supplies – including Covid-19 test kits – to vessels at sea is to be held at Montrose Port this week.

Project MediDrone, which uses remotely operated unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), or drones, was funded by a UK Government innovation grant and will involve the aircraft departing the quayside at Montrose and landing on a vessel offshore.

If successful, the trial could open up the opportunity for Covid-19 tests and other medical supplies to be delivered to and from vessels without them needing to dock or be boarded by harbour pilots, further reducing any risk of infection being brought back to shore and into the community.

The trials are being coordinated by London-based technology firm Neuron Innovations Ltd in partnership with ‘drone-in-a-box’ provider Herotech8 and specialist insurance and risk management company, Flock.

Montrose Port

Weather permitting, the flight will take place at midday on Thursday 29th April 2021.

Niall Greenwood, CEO at Neuron, said that Montrose was chosen for its location, facilities, and the management team’s forward-thinking approach: ‘We are delighted to be leading the Montrose Drone trials, to enable the delivery of medical supplies from shore to ship,” he said.

“Drones offer a much safer, faster, and more cost-effective method of delivery compared with more traditional approaches. By connecting the drone to Neuron’s surveillance network we have made a significant step to enabling these kinds of applications on a routine basis. The data from our networks provide the drone pilot with the ability to remotely observe nearby aircraft so that they can keep the drone safely separated from them”

Herotech8’s ‘drone-in-a-box’ solution comprises an automated recharging station and communication relay which allows the drone to be operated remotely and on-demand by a pilot situated at their offices at Cranfield University. The drone automatically takes off and lands and follows pre-programmed waypoints during its flight. The pilot is there just to monitor the drone during the flight to ensure the safety of the public and other airspace users.

Hamish Murray, Projects Team Leader at Montrose Port Authority, said: “Securing this trial is a unique opportunity for Montrose and adds to the growing list of innovative projects going on within the port and the broader local community. We already work closely with the team behind the proposed Montrose Drone Port and as well as using our quayside for the trials, our pilot boat and other port personnel will also be heavily involved. With our growing reputation within the offshore wind industry, as well as traditional oil and gas and general cargo, we can see drones potentially becoming a common sight in the skies above the port and at sea, and I’m glad that we are able to play such a pivotal role in helping shape the future of this exciting technology.”

Sam Golden at Flock added: “This trial paves the way for widespread use of drones for ship to shore delivery. We are showing how drones can improve safety, cut costs and increase efficiency in ports globally. I’m grateful to the UK government for supporting this trial and to Neuron for bringing together best in class companies to deliver on it. Great things can happen when companies are given the space to collaborate.”

The trial was made possible by a grant from UK Research and Innovation’s (UKRI’s) Future Flight Challenge. The consortium’s aim is to demonstrate how the safety and efficiency of ports can be improved using drones to reduce the number of trips to vessels by pilot boats which can take hours to complete and are made dangerous by the crew having to climb a rope ladder from one vessel to another.

26 April 2021

SAM IS ....
Sky-Futures brings Flock on board as drone insurance partner to support its global expansion


Sky-Futures, one of the world’s leading drone inspection and survey service providers, has appointed connected insurance provider, Flock, as its drone insurance partner. 

The partnership will enable Sky-Futures to seamlessly scale its drone insurance in line with its global expansion plans. The company has now conducted hundreds of large scale projects in over 33 countries, with further plans for expansion for 2021. 

Sky-Futures will also be able to harness insights generated by Flock’s risk intelligence engine to further optimise safety standards, allowing them to continue reducing risk and thereby unlock additional insurance savings. 

Images: https://drive.google.com/drive/u/0/folders/18T7hClnUvBsffnaEqZa9_ffrLoSz39RQ

In the past 10 years, Sky-Futures has risen to prominence as one of the largest drone-based inspection and survey organisations globally. The company conducts a range of services across sectors including oil and gas, telecommunications, utilities, renewables, engineering, maritime and survey. Sky-Futures was acquired by private equity-backed, asset integrity management business, ICR Integrity in May 2019. 

Chris Blackford, CEO of Sky-Futures said: “Safety is key for Sky-Futures and our customers, and we needed an insurance partner that shared this focus in everything they do. Flock goes above and beyond, helping to drive safety standards across the drone industry and accelerating the adoption of emerging technology worldwide.

“As we’ve continued to expand globally, we needed to ensure that our insurance partner had the capability to keep up with our complex needs and rapid rate of growth. We are adding new drones, pilots, and locations to our policy almost every week, it was therefore important that we engaged a data-driven insurtech like Flock could keep up with our quickly changing requirements.” 

Ed Leon Klinger, CEO of Flock said: “At Flock, we take pride in supporting some of the world’s largest drone fleets with fair, flexible and transparent insurance. Sky-Futures has been an industry pioneer for many years, and we’re delighted to bring them on board.

 “In an increasingly connected and autonomous world, it’s essential that insurance companies leverage the vast amounts of real-time data available to provide fair, accurate pricing for their customers. But we can go further – at Flock, we’re helping our customers understand their own exposure to complex risks, how this impacts their policy price, and how to reduce it over time”. 

Established in 2016, Flock has analysed over a million drone flights and insures thousands of commercial drone operators, from micro-SMEs to global fleets. The insurtech’s risk intelligence engine ingests realtime, third party and proprietary data to calculate risk on a per-flight basis. This analysis takes into account a wide variety of datasets, from hyper-local weather and traffic flows to the operating temperature and wind resistance of the drones themselves. 

Flock uses the data generated by its risk intelligence engine to create in-depth risk profiles of every operator it insures. These risk profiles allow Flock to provide customers with exposure-based insurance policies and reports detailing the major factors impacting risk. By making operational changes based on these risk reports, companies can improve safety standards and, as a result, unlock additional insurance savings. 

The London-based insurtech is now working with insurers to scale globally and apply its technology to additional industries, all as part of its goal of becoming the go-to insurer for a connected and autonomous world.

About Flock 

Flock, a London-based insurtech on a mission to make the world a smarter, safer place. We’re reinventing commercial insurance from the ground up by using cutting edge technology to price, insure, and mitigate fleet risks.

Having soared to dominance in the commercial drone industry, we’ve now set our sights on becoming the go-to insurer for the connected and autonomous world. We believe the insurer of the future will be actively helping customers reduce incidents instead of just being there when something goes wrong.

‍Flock’s roots are in academia and data science, arising from research papers at Imperial College London and Cambridge University. We launched Europe’s first ‘pay-as-you-fly‘ drone insurance product in 2018, and have skyrocketed since then.

Flock’s digital underwriting platform has enabled a range of data-driven insurance and risk management products in the drone industry, from on-demand insurance for individual operators to an conneted exposure based product for the world’s largest drone fleets including Sky-Futures, Terra Drone and Lorenz Technologies. We now work with leading underwriters, aviation authorities and major manufacturers to help thousands of customers to fly safer and smarter every single day.

About Sky-Futures

Since 2009, Sky-Futures has established itself as the world’s leading provider of drone-based inspection services to the global industrial markets. This expertise, operational knowledge and experience have been employed to develop ground-breaking software, sensor and technology solutions for the drone-based industrial inspection market. Our leading technology is being used today by clients looking to harness the power of drone-driven data collection and analysis.

Sky-Futures enables Enterprise to perform safe and cost-effective drone inspections of a variety of vertical infrastructures, including but not limited to the following industries: Oil and Gas; Renewables; Utilities; Telecoms; Bridges; and Engineering.

Both Flock and Sky-Futures are ARPAS-UK Members and we are delighted to see Members working together.

November 10 2020

SAM IS ....
Flock’s initiatives to help the drone industry

ARPAS-UK Member, Flock has launched a number of initiatives to help support customers, staff and the commercial drone industry during the ongoing coronavirus outbreak.

  • PLEDGING £10,000 TO THE FIGHT

Flock are committed to provide £10,000 of free insurance to organisations using drones to tackle coronavirus and the issues it is causing. Apply below to find out if you’re eligible.  ‍Learn more and apply

 

  • ADDITIONAL CUSTOMER SUPPORT

To ensure Flock continue to support their customers globally, they’ve extended their office hours and launched an emergency out-of-hours hotline. Reach them on live chat, email or phone at 02039665583.  Contact the team

 

  • FREEZE POLICIES FOR FREE

Many of their customers are having their commercial jobs cancelled due to Coronavirus. So Flock are extending the ability to pause policies to all of their subscription customers. Find out how

 

Ed Leon Klinger, CEO at Flock, has the following message: “As the situation develops, we will continue to listen carefully to our customers. We’re in this together; the Flock team and I are working hard (from home!) to do all we can to help. Please get in touch with me personally with any questions or suggestions.

 

SAM IS ....
Flock partners with African Drone Forum 2020 to enable the drone operations of tomorrow

  • Flock joins the World Bank, UK Aid, the World Economic Forum and the Government of Rwanda as the exclusive risk partner of the African Drone Forum 2020.

  • The UK insurtech is providing the insurance needed to conduct beyond visible line of sight (BVLOS) flight competitions on Lake Kivu, Rwanda

  • Flock’s data-driven approach to insurance allows it to identify, understand and insure against complex air mobility risks

 

Today, ARPAS-UK Member, Flock announces it is the exclusive risk partner of African Drone Forum 2020 which launches this week. The UK insurtech will be using its world-leading understanding of air mobility risk to provide a custom insurance policy for the flight competitions during the event. 

All flights during African Drone Forum 2020, including a range of BVLOS competitions over Lake Kivu, the largest lake in Rwanda, will be fully insured through one of Flock’s Enterprise policies. 

 

Jonty Slater, Competitions Manager at African Drone Forum 2020 said “We’re delighted to have Flock on board as the exclusive risk partner of African Drone Forum 2020. This event is paving the way for the adoption and safe use of drones in everything from cargo to search and rescue. Flock’s innovative approach to insurance is integral to accelerating this shift to a smarter and safer world.” 

 

Ed Leon Klinger, CEO of Flock said “We’re delighted to be the risk partner of this year’s African Drone Forum. This event is one of the only opportunities in the world for manufacturers and operators to showcase the potential of their technology. I’m proud our data-driven approach to insurance has played a part in letting it take place.” 

 

Taking place near Lake Kivu in Rwanda, the African Drone Forum 2020 is an opportunity for companies to showcase how drones can help improve information sharing, supply chains and logistics in Rwanda and worldwide. Other key partners include the World Bank, UK Aid, the World Economic Forum and the Government of Rwanda.

 

Some of the world’s leading drone manufacturers and operators will compete in the ‘Lake Kivu Challenge’ where successful participants have the chance to win cargo delivery contracts and take a key role in helping advances thoughtfully the application of UASs to improve supply chains and advance sustainable economies in Africa. Competitors include Avy, German Drones, Phoenix Wings, Wingcopter, Venturi and Volans-i, Hojung Solutions, Drone Adventures, Qlex and Leapr Labs.

 

One of the competitions insured by Flock involved delivering a package of medical supplies from Palm Beach Drone port to Bugarura Island, a 20km trip, giving operators a chance to demonstrate their ability to safely conduct groundbreaking BVLOS flights. The delivery of medical supplies by drone could one day have a major impact on the residents of Bugarura island where there is currently only one health post and a handful of health workers. The winner of this competition will be awarded to whichever company can conduct the quickest, safest and most user-friendly flight.

 

Winners will be invited to speak at a drone event hosted by Zipline, one of the world’s most innovative and advanced drone delivery companies.

 

Flock’s risk intelligence technology draws on realtime data such as wind speed, temperature and geographic factors to identify, understand and insure the risks of each flight. This allows drone operators to align costs with activity, unlike traditional insurance policies. At the end of an agreed time period, Enterprise customers are given insights on how they could fly safer and smarter. By taking this guidance on board they are rewarded with lower premiums.

www.flockcover.com

6th February 2020

SAM IS ....
Skyports and Flock open up the skies for safe, fully-insured Drone Deliveries

2019 has been a good year for drone deliveries. Zipline has made over 10,000 drop offs of medical supplies in Rwanda, UPS gained FAA approval to operate a drone airline and now, Flock is working with Skyports to help safe and fully-insured global drone deliveries really take off.

Today we’re excited to announce we’re working with Skyports, to deliver a custom insurance programme for drone delivery, one that evolves as the company moves from testing in the UK, Belgium, Sweden and Finland all the way to widespread commercial use.

This news follows the launch of Flock Enterprise, our insurance offering tailored for the world’s largest drone fleets. To date we’ve insured over 3,000 commercial drone businesses with that number growing daily.

What the media had to say about the news…

Flock’s CEO, Ed Leon Klinger commented:

“Skyports is one of the truly groundbreaking companies reinventing the future of urban mobility. Our unique approach to real-time insurance will enable them to capitalise on granular risk insights to proactively mitigate flight risks, improve safety standards across their fleets, and reduce their insurance premiums.

“Flock Enterprise enables large drone companies to undertake increasingly complex flights and operations, from oil and gas inspections to autonomous package delivery. We’re proud that our technology is opening up the world’s airspace and accelerating growth of the industry.”

Skyports has operations in Europe, North America, Africa and Asia and has already agreed rooftop licenses for vertiports on 15 sites in London so far. They believe that drone flights from vertiports will be a regular occurrence in London as soon as 2021, with medical delivery services likely to be the first to market and passenger flights soon after.

On the partnership, Duncan Walker, Managing Director of Skyports added:

“Skyports philosophy is to partner with companies early on to ensure we meet our customers’ needs and Flock provides this service for us. We have big plans to expand our global drone delivery operations and vertiport infrastructure offering and our tailored insurance cover with Flock ensures we do this safely whilst keeping costs low for our customers.”

Our recent whitepaper into the emergence of exposure-based insurance for the drone industry reports that an increase in commercial activity will be the major driver in drones becoming a $100 billion market globally by 2020. The Skyports partnership signifies this shift is already underway and provides a glimpse into the future of urban mobility.

By Sam Golden

for Flock

October 17 2019

SAM IS ....
Flock launches first ‘real-time’ insurance and risk management product for drone fleets

‘Flock Enterprise’ will help drone fleet operators take proactive steps to reduce drone flight risk, and reward them with cheaper insurance premiums.

 London, 18 June, 2019 – ARPAS-UK Member, Flock, the London-based insurtech startup, unveiled today ‘Flock Enterprise’, a first-of-its-kind insurance and risk management solution for drone fleets. The product leverages real-time data to provide highly bespoke insurance policies for enterprises using drones. This data-driven approach transforms how organisations insure their connected drone fleets, offering greater visibility into flight risk and rewarding safer flights with cheaper insurance premiums.

 

Flock Enterprise is the first product worldwide to offer real-time insurance for drone fleets. Several notable organisations are already using the solution including Flock’s flagship customer Texo DSI, a drone survey and inspection company who operate the world’s most dynamic, multi-million pound drone fleet.

 

Flock Enterprise is powered by Flock’s proprietary Risk Intelligence Engine, which analyses and prices real-time drone flight risks on an individual basis. High-risk drone flights (such as those undertaken in densely populated areas, or during bad weather) receive higher risk metrics, and therefore higher insurance prices. Safer flights (such as those undertaken in rural areas, or during optimal weather conditions) are met with lower prices. Individual flight prices are then seamlessly aggregated to calculate a monthly premium, which fairly reflects the actual usage and risk profile of a drone fleet in a given month.

 

 

Flock’s Risk Intelligence Engine

 

Unique to Flock’s innovative insurance model are the granular risk insights that are shared with customers. By using these insights, enterprises can proactively improve safety standards across their fleets and reduce their insurance premiums as a result.

Flock has already demonstrated the financial and safety benefits of its risk analysis technology. After launching Europe’s first Pay-as-you-fly drone insurance product in conjunction with Allianz, Flock has analysed and priced the risk of more than 500,000 drone flights. By clearly visualising these risks in Flock’s app, thousands of drone pilots have been empowered to optimise towards lower-risk flights, and reduce their policy price by an average of 15% as a result.

 

Thousands of pilots have used Flock’s Pay-as-you-fly mobile app to pinpoint where and when it is safest to fly.

 

White paper:

 

In conjunction with the launch of Flock Enterprise, Flock has published a white paper detailing the use of real-time data in insurance and risk management. To access the white paper for free, visit Flock’s website.

 

 

Ed Leon Klinger, Flock CEO said: “At Flock, we believe that insurance can be so much more than a piece of paper. We’re using cutting edge data science to not only unlock fully digital, customer-centric insurance products, but to completely transform the way organisations understand, manage, and mitigate their own risks.”

 

He added: “Our Pay-as-you-fly insurance policies have now helped thousands of small businesses fly safer. With the launch of Flock Enterprise, we’re making our technology available to some of the largest drone companies in the world. We’re delighted to be enabling Texo and others to expand the use-cases of our technology and theirs.”

 

Graham Brown, Chief Executive Officer, ARPAS-UK said: “Flock have created a new level of insurance for companies who want to access real-time data when assessing their flights. This will support both pilots and Managers in understanding risks involved to help them make the best possible decisions.”

 

David Williams, Chief Operating Officer, Texo iHUB said: “We see Flock more as a partner than as an insurer. Rather than simply offering us a price, they actively help our pilots and risk managers identify and minimise the organisational risks we’re undertaking.”

He added: ‘We’re excited to work closely with them moving forward to really push the boundaries of what’s possible in the commercial drone industry.”

 

__________________________

 

Notes to editors

 

Additional information about Flock:

 

  • Flock is a London-based, VC- and Government-backed insurtech startup operating at the cutting edge of the data analytics and insurance spaces. Flock began its journey as an academic research project in 2015. Having partnered with Allianz, the world’s leading aviation insurer, Flock now insures 30% of commercial drone businesses in the UK with its suite of fully digital, data-driven drone insurance and risk-management products. These range from Pay-as-you-fly policies for SMEs, up to usage-based enterprise insurance for connected drone fleets.
  •  Flock is initially launching Flock Enterprise to UK-based drone organisations (with their global flights covered). Flock Enterprise provides bespoke equipment insurance for fleets of any size and drone type, with flexible liability limits (up to £25M). Flock is planning to roll out Flock Enterprise to international drone organisations in the future.
  • Flock is now working with global insurers to capture new markets entirely and make the world a safer, smarter place with its technology. Flock’s Risk Intelligence Engine equips insurers to accurately identify and quantify risk in an entirely new way, allowing them to confidently build and launch never-before-seen products in new industries.

 

Additional information about Texo

 

  • Texo provide fully integrated survey and inspection services, delivered by the most advanced fleet of drones and associated sensor payloads. The company supports sectors such as: critical infrastructure, Oil & Gas, Nuclear, Renewables, Construction and Utilities allowing clients to make highly informed engineering decisions, based on the very highest levels of safety, efficiency and accuracy.
  • Texo hold the UK’s most comprehensive set of congested area commercial flight permissions ever awarded by the UK Civil Aviation Authority (CAA).

Flockcover.com