From Hour to Minutes: Skye Air Drones join forces with Blue Dart for swift Gurugram deliveries

A customer receiving their Blue Dart package delivered with the help of Skye Air's drones in Gurugram

If you are a resident of Fresco (housing society), in Gurugram's Nirvana Country or two other societies in the city, chances are that your parcels that are being sent through logistics company Blue Dart, is being delivered via drones.

National Capital Region-based startup Skye Air, has tied up with DHL Group's Blue Dart to deliver items with the help of drones. The deliveries started a couple of weeks ago, and Ankit Kumar, the CEO of Skye Air estimates that has been able to shorten delivery times from 1 hour, using conventional methods, to 7-8 minutes using drones.

"We fly from Sector 70- 71 in Gurugram. We have our hub in the area. The drone takes off from there it goes to a port (Skye Pod), which is in a residential complex. We have activated Skye Pods in three societies right now for Blue Dart," Kumar told Moneycontrol.

Kumar added that taking into consideration the current heatwave in the NCR region, where temperatures have even hit 50°C, the drones fly from 6 am to 11 am. "We don't fly from 11 am to 6 pm," Kumar said.

Skye Pods are containers installed for last-mile delivery executives to collect and deliver to the customer's doorsteps.

After the parcel gets dropped off at the Skye Pod installed in these societies, a delivery person employed by the startup (whom they refer to as "Skyewalkers") delivers it to the customer's apartment.

Skye Air has been leveraging "green zones" in Gurugram for these deliveries. These areas include places like Golf Course extension, SPR, New Gurugram, Dwarka Expressway, Sector 50 (which is where Fresco is located) and so on.

In India's drone ecosystem, "green zones" refer to areas where drone operations can be conducted without requiring prior permission from the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA). These zones are established to facilitate easier and more flexible usage of drones for various purposes, including commercial, recreational, and governmental activities.

However, Kumar pointed out that the startup had to jump through hoops to secure permissions for delivering to these three housing societies, from the local administration.

"We had to take a ton of approvals. The country doesn't yet have a full-fledged, good architecture to give any form of approval. Although things have become easy, we still do have to take a lot of approvals," he added.

Apart from the three Skye Pods active in the three housing societies, Kumar said that they have installed at least 80 across housing societies in Gurugram. He said a couple of more such pods are active for drone deliveries. However, he declined from naming the partner with which they are doing such deliveries, citing confidentiality.

Kumar has been betting on the usage of drones for e-commerce, citing environmental reasons and also welfare of delivery executives.

"The biggest pain today is for the riders. Let's say you ordered something on it, the rider came to your doorstep to deliver it. And you're not there. He will not get paid for that delivery. What happens in my system, that even if even if it is attempted and not delivered, it doesn't leave the Pods, it stays in there. The next day one can even go to the Pod and there might be a Walker, who can open the pod and give the package to you at that point of time itself," he explained.