Together with Robots Expert, Ultrahack is organizing an international innovation tournament based in Helsinki, Finland, which consists of several challenges that will take advantage of various technologies, including 5G networks and satellite technology. Both companies expect to promote the use of unmanned aerial vehicles through this tournament and are responsible for the execution of each challenge.

One of the focuses of this event is on a drone’s landing phase. As stated on the tournament’s website, the biggest challenge in current drone logistics is the landing, which is particularly difficult in a changing environment, such as construction sites. For that reason, new sensor technologies and artificial intelligence solutions should be developed so that drones can collect accurate information about their surroundings, such as humans, trees, buildings, electrical wires and other obstacles that increase the risks related to landing and deliver to construction sites more efficiently and safely in the near future.

With the help of Stara, Helsinki City Construction Services, one of the challenges, called Last Mile Logistics, will ask competitors to execute an urgent delivery in a simulated manner. This includes all the steps between ordering and successfully delivering a product by drone to a construction site in an urban environment.

“Stara extensively offers everything that belongs to a well-functioning city. In the Last Mile Logistics challenge we are now looking for a model, where a critical component can be delivered to a building site without any delay,” stated Sami Aherva, Head of Logistics at Stara. “In the best-case scenario, a solution like this could be utilized even broader in the service production for the city of Helsinki. Stara wishes to serve as a development platform for corporate service development, as we seek solutions for the everyday needs of our production.”

Other tests will be held at a challenging performance site where competitors will need to perform navigating and landing tasks that require precision. The GNSS landing and navigation challenge will see competitors take advantage of GNSS-based solutions for positioning down to centimeter accuracy to land and navigate through obstacles within 5 minutes. Finally, the Beyond Visual Line of Sight (BVLOS) flight over 5G challenge is similar to the GNSS one but uses a 5G mobile network for Command-and-Control link and video stream. 

As an unmanned aviation advisory and expert company based in Finland, Robots Expert is known for promoting scalable drone business in Europe. The company’s goal is to help organizations increase operational effectiveness using drones and advise cities on how to allow and control drones in the urban landscape. Additionally, Robots Expert works with the fundamental capabilities needed to safely scale up drone use - U-space and radio networks - and offers a range of specialist services from training and SORA advisory to hosted BVLOS testing range for national and international drone manufacturers or operators.

Ultrahack’s tournament will take place in late October 2021 in connection with the Assembly Summer 2021 Fall Edition event in Helsinki. During the event, participants will have access to U-blox, Spirent, and Septentrio’s satellite technology. For more information and a description of each challenge, visit the tournament’s website.