Life Saving Drones

TEAM Insaaf Ismath, Janith Kalpana

The partners in this exhibit stated, “Using this drone you can save the lives of people faster than a normal life saver could. 80% of the time the drone can reach the person faster. In the world around 1.3 million people die because they can’t be reached on time and our drone solves this problem. It is an autonomous drone that can be controlled manually and also has life-saving gear. At the moment we have these rings on the side that the person can hold on to, so that the person has a fighting chance until the life saver arrives.” They further stated that most of the funds came from themselves and from competitions that they’ve won. “As a team we have won 3rd place in the Uva Wellassa Battlebot challenge and 1st place in the Mora Ventures 1.0.”

“Funding is an issue because it’s a hardware intensive project so we have to spend on the parts. The major problem is that drones are a new concept to Sri Lanka and it’s difficult to find a good environment to support it and fund it. What we see is that Sri Lanka is very reluctant for new technology. In addition to this we have to consider the taxation in the country. Around 20%-30% of our funds go for taxes. It would be great if there was some mechanism to reduce the taxation on start ups and companies to help them develop their products. Another problem we face here is the fact that the electronic industry in Sri Lanka is very small and there is no scope in the country, which pushes people who are interested in robotics to pursue it elsewhere. We hope to create an environment in Sri Lanka where people will be able to work on their interests within the country in order to develop our economy and the country,” they added.

“This exhibition gives exposure to our projects and shows people that we are capable of being innovative and futuristic.”