Airobotics partners with Rockblast to bring automated drones to Chile

An Israeli technology solutions provider has entered into a strategic partnership that will see automated drones introduced to the Chilean mining industry.

Airobotics, a leading player automated drone technology, has partnered with the engineering company Rockblast to implement its automated system to a number of Chilean mining companies.

Rockblast was the first company to introduce a fully automated drone system into South America, in a bid to improve the country’s search or efficiency, safety and cost effectiveness.

“We’re successfully implementing our autonomous drones with Tier 1 mining companies in the US, Australia and Israel, and we’re excited to expand our operations into Chile,” said Ran Krauss, CEO and Co-Founder of Airobotics. “The Optimus drone will help improve Minera Centinela’s competitiveness in the market, increase efficiency, and improve safety for its employees. Our partnership with RockBlast will also allow us to deliver our disruptive technology to mines across Chile improving the overall mining industry in the country.

Minera Centinela is one of the largest mining companies in Chile and is consistently seeking out new ways of improving efficiency and productivity across its mine sites. Airobotics will work with Minera to implement a 24/7 multi-purpose functionality solution.

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Already, mining sites across Chile have reported close to 25% increase in productivity, with drones being identified as one of the most versatile and cost-effective means of achieving these results.

Airobotics’ automated drones perform a variety of applications, which will be implemented at RockBlast’s customer mine sites, enabling continuous operation of the open pit while retrieving highly accurate data of operational progress. These applications include:

●      Stockpile volumes and end-of-month reconciliation

●      Terrain mapping and change detection

●      Asset management and scheduling

●      Situational awareness and emergency response

●      Infrastructure and equipment inspection

●      Security and surveillance

“Drones have positioned themselves as a technological tool of high value throughout the world, particularly in mining. As part of the growing digitization of information in mining, the data obtained by drones has become an essential factor for decision making in the different stages of the mining process and RockBlast, together with Airobotics, is a part of this new era,” said Horacio Gutierrez Abelaida, CEO of RockBlast.