Seattle-based Amazon has commmitted itself to begin using drones to make its deliveries when it can and had hoped to pilot the technology in the US. But permission from the US Federal Aviation Administration took six months to come through, by which time the prototype was obsolete. Paul Misener of Amazon told a Senate Committee this week: 'Nowhere outside of the United States have we been required to wait more than one or two months to begin testing.' 

Drone market worth billions of dollars

The UK is now looking like a more welcoming location to test the technology, says Dr Ravi Vaidyanathan, robotics lecturer at London's Imperial College. He said: 'For commercial growth, it probably does provide an opportunity because companies can do more [in the UK], so they can gauge more of the market and the likely impact.' The potential of the drone industry has been put at 'billions of dollars' by lawyer Komal K Jain, assistant general counsel at the American Chemistry Council.  

Permissive rules in Europe

Gregory S Neal, professor of law and public policy at Pepperdine University, believes that new EU regulations are, possibly, a couple of years ahead of those being developed in the US. He said: 'If European regulators have their way, drone operations in the European Union are going to become very permissive, far outpacing American regulations.' 

Sources: Forbes, BBC and BeyondTeleComLaw Blog