The Sky Guys (TSG, private), a leading drone service company based in Toronto,is teaming with NVIDIA, IBM and University of Toronto to work with Ministry ofTransportation of Ontario (MTO) to develop an artificial intelligence-powered dronesolution to better enforce the usage of the 16.5km stretch of the high-occupancy toll(HOT) / high-occupancy vehicle (HOV) lanes along Ontario’s 400-series highways(LINK). TSG has been awarded $750k from Ontario Centres of Excellence for thisproject.    We consider this to be a good indicator of the growing interest by theprovincial government to utilize drone-based solutions as a way to properlyenforce traffic regulations, collect revenue and lower personnel cost. Currentenforcement of the HOT/HOV lanes involves manual visual by the law enforcementagencies, which is a daunting task given the number of vehicles traveling on the400-series highways and the difficulty associated with proper enforcement in poorweather conditions such as rain and snow. Drone-based solutions could cover abroader area and longer distance without requiring a large number of personnelwhile the AI-enabled image recognition that is designed to detect and analyse thenumber of passengers can ensure a more proper enforcement.    Drone-based road monitoring is already being used in France and has proven tobe an effective toll in traffic enforcement. We note the Bordeaux police force havebeen using drones for traffic enforcement over the past several months as a low-costalternative to helicopters, and drones have so far been proven as an effectivecomplement to local law enforcement, stopping 10-15 trucks per hour that violatecommon traffic laws compared with the single-digit rate under manual monitoring(LINK). We think Canada may be on the path to adopt similar measure given ouroutsized landmass and limited number of enforcement personnel.    More important, TSG’s collaboration with MTO illustrates the importance ofArtificial Intelligence in the future of monitoring/inspection and as adifferentiator from the other aerial-based drone services. We recently met withTSG and were impressed by the company’s impressive list of clientele, provenbusiness model across multiple sectors and the fact that it is one of few droneservice providers in Canada that is actively investing in artificial intelligence incollaboration with industries leaders such as NVDA and IBM (LINK). Going forward,we can expect more Canadian drone service providers to move beyond simpleaerial imagery but to adopt AI in their respective verticals (ie. agriculture,underwater) by leveraging big data in order to gain a sustainable advantage.    Privacy concerns remain a hurdle to broader adoption but we think that companiessuch as TSG can eventually work alongside the regulators to formulate a mechanicthat can properly ensure privacy while carryout proper law enforcement.    Drone Delivery Canada (FLT CN, OP, TP: $1.00) is already implementing earlyforms of AI but we think the future progression will be to leverage flight and weatherdata so that drones can operate more efficiently as they operate out of sight. This isparticularly important when larger drones such as the Flyox model that can carry>1 ton of payload are being utilized. Other Canadian-listed companies that areexposed to this theme include Deveron UAS (DVR CN, NR), Kraken Robotics(PNG CN, NR), Global UAV Technology (UAV CN, NR).

声明：如本站内容不慎侵犯了您的权益，请联系邮箱：wangshiyuan@epins.cn 我们将迅速删除。