(Yicai) July 8 -- Shenzhen, a city in China’s southern Guangdong province with a complete drone supply chain and excellent low-altitude airspace conditions, is actively exploring new application scenarios for low-altitude drone flights.

A drone developed by Insky followed a predetermined path around the top of the Ping An Financial Center, the tallest building in Shenzhen, to conduct a check-up of the skyscraper’s conditions on July 6. It was the first time drones were used for such purpose in the city.

Intelligent drones can shuttle between high-rise buildings to carry out high-precision, high-efficiency inspections, which have lower costs and fewer safety risks than traditional inspections, Insky’s founder and Chief Executive Shi Wei told Yicai.

As of the end of last year, Insky’s smart drones had completed inspections of over 10 million square meters of urban high-rise building facades in China, Shi said. Shenzhen has robust demand for high-rise drone inspection services because it has more than 20 buildings taller than 300 meters and over 200 taller than 200 meters, he noted.

Shenzhen also uses drones for other application scenarios, such as food and parcel delivery, fire-fighting, and test flights for electric vertical takeoff and landing aircraft intercity transportation. Drones have clear advantages in some fields, especially in the transportation of time-sensitive, high-value goods, such as emergency supply and fresh food cold chain, and high-risk operation scenarios.

Shenzhen has opened 205 drone routes with over 860,000 cargo-carrying drone flights completed since last year, being the leading Chinese city in this field, according to data from Shenzhen’s transport bureau.

After 20 years of development, Shenzhen has formed a complete drone supply chain integrating research and development, manufacturing, application, and services, with consumer- and industrial-grade drones made in the city accounting for 70 percent and 50 percent, respectively, of the global market share.

The output value of Shenzhen’s low-altitude economy exceeded CNY90 billion (USD12.4 billion) last year, as the city was home to more than 1,700 drone-related companies, according to official data.

Editors: Tang Shihua, Futura Costaglione