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Yuneec International is a Chinese aircraft manufacturer based in
Jinxi, Kunshan Jinxi () is a historic canal town in southwest Kunshan, Jiangsu Province, China. It lies 8 kilometers from the famous ancient town Zhouzhuang. It is surrounded by lakes – Dianshan Lake to its east, Cheng Lake to its west, Wubao Lake to its south ...
, a town in
Jiangsu Jiangsu (; ; pinyin: Jiāngsū, alternatively romanized as Kiangsu or Chiangsu) is an eastern coastal province of the People's Republic of China. It is one of the leading provinces in finance, education, technology, and tourism, with its c ...
owned through an off-shore
Cayman Islands The Cayman Islands () is a self-governing British Overseas Territory—the largest by population in the western Caribbean Sea. The territory comprises the three islands of Grand Cayman, Cayman Brac and Little Cayman, which are located to the s ...
holding company, Yuneec Holding Limited. Yuneec was originally a manufacturer of radio-controlled model aircraft and marketed its man-carrying aircraft in the United States through GreenWing International. Yuneec produced the Yuneec International E430, the first electric aircraft designed to be commercially produced, although only prototypes were ever built. In the late 2010s, the company moved to specialize in the development and production of
unmanned aerial vehicles An unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), commonly known as a drone, is an aircraft without any human pilot, crew, or passengers on board. UAVs are a component of an unmanned aircraft system (UAS), which includes adding a ground-based controller ...
(UAVs), for the
aerial photography Aerial photography (or airborne imagery) is the taking of photographs from an aircraft or other airborne platforms. When taking motion pictures, it is also known as aerial videography. Platforms for aerial photography include fixed-wing airc ...
role.


History

Yuneec was originally a manufacturer of radio-controlled
model aircraft A model aircraft is a small unmanned aircraft. Many are replicas of real aircraft. Model aircraft are divided into two basic groups: flying and non-flying. Non-flying models are also termed static, display, or shelf models. Aircraft manufactur ...
sold under another brands, primarily
Horizon Hobby Horizon Hobby, LLC. is an American international hobby product distributor, headquartered in Champaign, Illinois, United States. It currently manufactures various hobby-grade radio-controlled (RC) models, as well as Athearn model trains and die- ...
.


Electric aircraft development

The company built the first successful
electric Electricity is the set of physical phenomena associated with the presence and motion of matter that has a property of electric charge. Electricity is related to magnetism, both being part of the phenomenon of electromagnetism, as described ...
powered paraglider Powered paragliding, also known as paramotoring or PPG, is a form of ultralight aviation where the pilot wears a back-pack motor (a paramotor) which provides enough thrust to take off using a paraglider. It can be launched in still air, and on ...
that was manufactured in series production, the EPac. Former company owner Tian Yu then turned his attention to an electric
ultralight trike An ultralight trike is a type of powered hang glider where flight control is by weight-shift. These aircraft have a fabric flex-wing from which is suspended a tricycle fuselage pod driven by a pusher propeller. The pod accommodates either a s ...
, the Yuneec International ETrike. From there he designed a series of electric motors, the Yuneec Power Drive series, the all-composite E430 and the EViva motorglider. Collaboration with Flightstar Sportplanes of the US brought the Yuneec International e-Spyder design to completion, using an existing airframe with new electric power components.Bayerl, Robby; Martin Berkemeier; et al: ''World Directory of Leisure Aviation 2011-12'', page 85. WDLA UK, Lancaster UK, 2011. In July 2010, Yuneec's E430 electric aircraft, won the Lindbergh Electric Airplane Prize at the World Electric Aircraft symposium. Yuneec's e-Spyder was the world's first certified electric aircraft, having received the DULV Type Certification in February 2013.


A pivot to consumer drones (ca. 2014–present)

In 2014 the company became a founding member of Dronecode, a non-profit hosted by the
Linux Foundation The Linux Foundation (LF) is a non-profit technology consortium founded in 2000 as a merger between Open Source Development Labs and the Free Standards Group to standardize Linux, support its growth, and promote its commercial adoption. Addit ...
with the aim of providing
Linux kernel The Linux kernel is a free and open-source, monolithic, modular, multitasking, Unix-like operating system kernel. It was originally authored in 1991 by Linus Torvalds for his i386-based PC, and it was soon adopted as the kernel for the GNU ope ...
-based common
free software Free software or libre software is computer software distributed under terms that allow users to run the software for any purpose as well as to study, change, and distribute it and any adapted versions. Free software is a matter of liberty, no ...
for drone manufacturers. In August 2015, Intel Corporation invested $60 million in Yuneec for a 15% stake. Intel and Yuneec agreed to work together on development of future projects. That same month, Yuneec launched Breeze, a drone capable of capturing UltraHD 4K photos and videos. Yuneec announced a retail partnership with Best Buy covering the Typhoon drone series and the Typhoon Wizard controller. The Typhoon G featuring its GB203 3-axis gimbal designed for use with the
GoPro GoPro, Inc. (marketed as GoPro and sometimes stylized as GoPRO) is an American technology company founded in 2002 by Nick Woodman. It manufactures action cameras and develops its own mobile apps and video-editing software. Founded as Woodman L ...
camera was released in September 2015 to smooth and stabilize aerial footage. In October 2015, Yuneec released the Typhoon Wizard, an ultra-lightweight remote control compatible with the Typhoon drone series designed to be used with one hand. Yuneec partnered with Ocean Alliance, a whale conservation organization, in 2015 to create a safer way of collecting health data from whales. Rather than using biopsy darts, Ocean Alliance began using Yuneec drones outfitted with petri dishes to retrieve samples. One of Yuneec's drones, the Typhoon Q500+, was seized by the police in June 2016 when its operator was flying it near the White House. The operator crashed a drone on
The Ellipse The Ellipse (sometimes referred to as President's Park South) is a park south of the White House fence and north of Constitution Avenue and the National Mall in Washington, D.C. The Ellipse is also the name of the circumference street within th ...
near the
White House The White House is the official residence and workplace of the president of the United States. It is located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW in Washington, D.C., and has been the residence of every U.S. president since John Adams in 1800 ...
in October 2015. Yuneec released the Typhoon H in July 2016. The drone used the
Intel RealSense Intel RealSense Technology is a product range of depth and tracking technologies designed to give machines and devices depth perception capabilities. The technologies, owned by Intel are used in autonomous drones, robots, AR/VR, smart home device ...
3D depth camera technology which tracks depth and human motion. The SkyView FPV headset was released in August 2016. The headset connects to a drone's onboard camera allowing the user to control the drone from the first person view. In late 2016 the company established a new a research and development center, ''Yuneec Advanced Technology Labs AG'', near Zurich,
Switzerland ). Swiss law does not designate a ''capital'' as such, but the federal parliament and government are installed in Bern, while other federal institutions, such as the federal courts, are in other cities (Bellinzona, Lausanne, Luzern, Neuchâtel ...
to work on
computer vision Computer vision is an interdisciplinary scientific field that deals with how computers can gain high-level understanding from digital images or videos. From the perspective of engineering, it seeks to understand and automate tasks that the human ...
, obstacle avoidance and flight control software development. At the beginning of 2017 the company introduced the Yuneec H520, a modular hexacopter drone intended for the commercial market, including fire department, police, construction, surveying, inspection and mapping. The H520 can carry various cameras as payloads and can operate in an encrypted mode. A version, the Yuneec 3DR H520-G, was developed in conjunction with drone software company
3D Robotics 3DR is an American company headquartered in Berkeley, California that makes enterprise drone software for construction, engineering, and mining firms, along with government agencies. Prior to 2016, the company designed and marketed commercial ...
and intended for the American government and military market. In May 2017, suppliers reported that the company was arrears, but the company said that it was mainly due to the two sides had different opinions on product delivery quality and payment details. On the other hand, nearly half of Yuneec's suppliers had not been paid for more than a year. Yuneec has not made supplier payments on time since the second quarter of 2017. In September a 2019 Yuneec announced the Mantis G, a foldable drone with gimballed and stabilized camera. The same month the company and
Leica Camera AG Leica Camera AG () is a German company that manufactures cameras, optical lenses, photographic lenses, binoculars, rifle scopes and microscopes. The company was founded by Ernst Leitz in 1869 (Ernst Leitz Wetzlar), in Wetzlar, Germany. I ...
announced a strategic partnership and presented the Typhoon H3 drone, which incorporates camera software and hardware co-engineered with Leica.


Aircraft


References


External links

* {{Yuneec International aircraft Companies based in Jiangsu Yuneec aircraft Unmanned aerial vehicle manufacturers Aircraft manufacturers of China Chinese brands