Submitted Photo A SkySkopes drone flies on a mission.

A top drone-market analyst has named North Dakota’s SkySkopes as the No. 1 drone service provider in the United States and one of the top globally.

Drone Industry Insights ranks unmanned aviation companies based on a number of parameters that indicate how active a company is. Parameters include size, growth rate, strategic partnerships, public awareness and online activity.

SkySkopes has an office in Minot that provides services to the energy industry but also has been involved in other activities, including search and rescue. The company also has offices in Grand Forks, Fargo, Minneapolis, Camarillo, California, and Fort Worth, Texas.

“We’d like to be the first in people’s minds when they think about unmanned aircraft, and that’s why we’re also happy to be first in the rankings,” said SkySkopes CEO Matt Dunlevy. “To achieve the No. 1 ranking is absolutely, I think, important for us, for North Dakota, for the people that we’re employing who go out and do a great job every day, and also for our clients.”

SkySkopes, which hadn’t made the top 10 in last year’s rankings, shot to first place with the quality of year that it has had.

“We have had some extremely satisfying, impressive growth in no small part because of what we are seeing in North Dakota, especially coming out of cities such as Minot and Grand Forks,” Dunlevy said. “I’m extremely impressed with the work of our team, their safety-mindedness and the fact that we have not had to stop operations because of the pandemic.”

Highlights have included certifying its team as essential service personnel during the pandemic, positioning of the company on the cutting edge of some newer technologies and executing wildfire missions.

Dunlevy said a California wildfire believed to have been started by a spark from an improperly maintained power pole prompted utilities in high fire risk areas to commission drone companies to inspect poles in an attempt to mitigate problems and establish fire resistance.

During the pandemic, SkySkopes partnered with the University of North Dakota and North Dakota State University to use drones to spray disinfectants from the air in large indoor arenas. It investigated disinfection with drones in outdoor arenas, which showed that spraying with unmanned aircraft can be done effectively if ever needed.

Drone Industry Insights began several years ago in response to the need for data regarding the commercial drone industry. Because unmanned aviation remains a young industry, there has been a need to clarify who the serious players are, said Kay Wackwitz, the organization’s CEO and founder, Hamburg, Germany.

Drone Industry Insights developed parameters to bring the picture into focus and create an understanding around who the leaders are and where advancements were happening in the areas of service, hardware development and software development.

“This gives us the ability to rank these companies and to give people a pretty good picture of these companies,” Wackwitz said.

Of the thousands of companies around the world operating in drone service, Drone Industry Insights examined 750 companies with measurable data for its latest rankings.

The target audience for the rankings includes investors and manufacturers, but the rankings also get attention from governments, the drone companies themselves and their potential clients.

Dunlevy said his company’s success wouldn’t have been possible without the investment of Minot’s MAGIC Fund, which provided a forgivable loan in 2017.

“If you want to look at a good investment, the MAGIC Fund, as a vehicle, was instrumental in getting SkySkopes to be at the top of its industry,” he said. “So I can’t help but thank the city council, the City of Minot, the people of Minot, for how welcoming they’ve been, and we’re happy to have completed the MAGIC Fund program successfully.”

Last year, Frost & Sullivan selected SkySkopes as one of the top five drone services companies globally. Attributes that set SkySkopes apart included its work with advanced LiDAR sensors, its innovative stringing of high-power transmission lines with drones and its optical gas imaging system that can detect 20 different hydrocarbon gases.

Wackwitz said many strong players in unmanned aviation exist globally, even as the industry continues to emerge. He said the drone industry is nearing a tipping point at which the efforts going into marketing and demonstrating what drones can do will pay off as clients seek out drone services.

“We need companies like SkySkopes and also a lot of other leading companies in this space to push the envelope, to get things going, to spread the word, to facilitate drone technology,” Wackwitz said. “It’s really good to have pioneers like Matt and his team to get things done and push for more.”

Dunlevy said facilitating new technologies is an important piece of SkySkopes’ plan for growth.

“We have to stay on top of those things and reinvent ourselves, really so that we can hold on to this No. 1 ranking, and trust me, we intend to,” he said.