In a landmark achievement for India’s drone industry, ideaForge, a leading drone technology and manufacturing company, has now surpassed 550,000 successful UAV flights, with an ideaForge UAV taking off every 4 minutes. This pivotal milestone not only cements ideaForge’s leadership in the Indian UAV sector but also underscores its commitment to indigenous drone manufacturing. As part of India’s drive to become a global drone hub by 2030, ideaForge has achieved approximately 70% localization of critical drone components, marking significant progress in self-reliance through R&D, rigorous testing, and technological innovation.
From its inception, ideaForge has championed indigenization. Back in 2007, when India’s drone ecosystem lacked critical UAV subsystems, ideaForge innovated by developing its own proprietary autopilot system—years before the first open-source systems like ArduPilot. This homegrown approach has led to a robust technology stack, including custom UAV payloads, communication systems, and drone embedded systems specifically designed for military, defense, and surveillance applications. By maintaining strict supply chain control and avoiding sourcing intelligent components from countries of concern, ideaForge ensures security and reliability across its entire technology portfolio, from fixed-wing VTOL drones to traffic monitoring UAVs.
The deployment of ideaForge drones spans across border security, perimeter surveillance, forest monitoring, wildlife conservation, disaster response, volumetric surveys in mining and industrial mapping applications. Recently, ideaForge introduced innovative solutions such as the FLYGHT Drone-as-a-Service model for traffic monitoring and public safety, as well as specialized UAVs for volumetric estimation in mining and surveillance drones for critical infrastructure protection.
The PLI Scheme has further bolstered ideaForge’s expansion in R&D and production capacity, advancing India’s Atmanirbharta initiative. Leveraging this support, ideaForge has significantly reduced reliance on imports and built a domestic drone manufacturing ecosystem with 78 patents (granted and in process) covering UAV payloads, communication systems, autopilot technology, and fixed-wing hybrid drones.
In FY24, around 22% of ideaForge’s revenue is allocated towards product and technology development, with half of its workforce dedicated to developing cutting-edge solutions across hardware, software, and autopilot systems.
Its comprehensive in-house capabilities span everything from UAV control systems and zoom payloads to custom-built GIS mapping and volumetric survey drones for sectors like mining, forestry, and border security.
As ideaForge drives India’s UAV revolution, it reinforces its commitment to self-reliance, innovation, and a secure, scalable UAV manufacturing base that empowers India’s civil, defense, and industrial sectors.
About ideaForge Technology Limited
ideaForge is the pioneer and the pre-eminent market leader in the Indian unmanned aircraft systems (“UAS”). The company is backed by leading investors including Qualcomm, Infosys, Celesta Capital, Florintree, EXIM Bank, Infina Finance and other marquee institutional investors. It was ranked 5th globally in 2023 as a top dual-use (civil & military) drone manufacturer by Drone Industry Insights, the world’s leading drone market research and analytics company. ideaForge has the largest operational deployment of indigenous UAVs across India, with an ideaForge manufactured drone taking off every 4 minutes for surveillance and mapping applications. ideaForge customers have completed over 5,50,000+ flights using ideaForge UAVs.
To know more about ideaForge, visit www.ideaforgetech.com!
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ideaForge, India’s largest manufacturer of drones, has closed its Series B funding round of $20 Million led by Florintree, which is helmed by the former Blackstone India private equity Co-Head, Mathew Cyriac. The round also saw participation from its existing investors such as Celesta, which is a prominent deep tech investment fund, Infosys, Qualcomm and Infina, along with the Exim Bank of India.
Founded in 2007 by IIT Bombay alumni, ideaForge is packed with more than 15 years of research and development (R&D) with 20+ global patents. It dominates the Indian market with its drones being deployed for a mission every 6 minutes by Defence, Homeland Security and Enterprise customers. With a proven delivery track record and a large order book, ideaForge boasts of being the first Indian OEM to bag repeat contracts from the Indian Army for its SWITCH UAVs. Its customers also include the Indian Navy, Air Force, State Police Forces, BSF, NSG, CRPF, Adani, L&T, Indian Oil, Survey of India, Indian Railways, and so on.
ideaForge Co-founder & CEO, Ankit Mehta commented, “ideaForge is very happy to be associated with Florintree, which has a proven track record of helping organisations unlock enterprise value. ideaForge has grown 10X in the last two years and we will use this funding to invest in R&D, international expansion and building a world-class team. We want to continue to create high performance, reliable and autonomous drones that inspire the adoption of this technology.”
Mathew Cyriac, executive chairman, Florintree Advisors, with serial IPOs wins in Defence and Aerospace technology said, “Florintree has been tracking the drone sector closely for the last two years and ideaForge is one of the few globally competitive full stack players in the sector with scale and profitability. The strong order book built by the company is testament to the R&D work done by the team over the last 15 years and they are primed to grow exponentially. While the industry has proliferated in the last few years on the back of government policy, we expect ideaForge with its focus on building indigenous hardware within house software subsystems to gain an outsized market share in a rapidly growing industry.”
About ideaForge
Built on a strong foundation of interdisciplinary engineering, ideaForge is a global leader in UAV technology. Its drones offer class-leading performance, reliability, and autonomy, and have been widely adopted for defence, homeland security and enterprise applications. In India, ideaForge has the largest market share in the security, surveillance, and industrial market for drones. Its customers have conducted over 230,000 missions using its drones. For more information, visit www.ideaforge.co.in
About Florintree:
Florintree Advisors is a growth-stage private equity firm based out of Mumbai headed by ex-Blackstone India head. Its portfolio companies include MTAR Technologies, Data Patterns, Gokaldas Exports, Freight Tiger, FreshMenu, SatinCredit Care Network, Wealthdesk and a few other companies. Florintree’s most successful exit so far has been from MTAR Technologies Pvt Ltd, which they exited through a public offering.
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