In the many industries that drive innovation, drones seem to attract a lot of attention. Their versatility and adaptability made them great devices in many industries to boost innovation. Just have a look at Amazon’s example below.
 or this other video displaying Google’s secret program in Australia to test a in-house developed drone.
The drone revolution may just be as exciting and promising as the 3D printing revolution that is ahead us.
Many of the drone applications are still in the leisure and entertainment sector and we had all been waiting for something really new and amazing. The lily camera may be the next milestone we were waiting for. It may be a game changer like one of our client told us; but in our opinion, it’s just an intermediary milestone towards a more fundamental shift. But let’s start with the beginning. What is the Lily camera?
The Lily camera: your perfect companion for outdoor videos and selfies
The Lily camera is an auto-piloted drone that follows a tracker mounted on your wrist. Ok, it seems complicated but it’s not. It’s actually very simple and this is the beauty of the Lily Camera. The guys of Lily Roboitics solved a big customer’s pain: controlling and piloting the drone. This is not needed anymore with the Lily drone. The Lily just follows the signal which is emitted by the tracker (which ressembles a big watch as you can see on the video below) and that’s all. You just forget about the drone; it follows you, films you, can take pictures of you. You are the star and the drone is your very own paparazzi. How cool is that?
We must admit the video is just amazing and it’s very difficult not to imagine tons of things you could do with this device. We bet you’ll crave to buy one after watching the video.
When considering objectively the pro’s and con’s, you may however come to a different conclusion.
Why the Lily Camera may actually be useless
We see 3 big drawbacks of the Lily.
First, the autonomy is very short like on most drones. The drone will become useless after just 20 minutes and the batteries can’t be swapped. If you are an outdoor sport fanatic, will you carry the drone the whole day (or just half a day) for just 20 minutes of video ? And where will you find a plug to load the drone ?
Second, usages of this drone are actually pretty limited. If you’re not an outdoor fan, how will you use it?
Third, there is a little legal problem with the Lily. You may actually not be authorized to use it. Using drones is either forbidden or very limited (except for drones under 60 grams, which is obviously not the case of the Lily).
If you add up those 3 points, you way wonder under which conditions to safely use this device … and come to the conclusion that it can’t be used safely (at least in Europe).
Conclusion
The strength of the Lily Camera is also its biggest weakness. This drone is a pure product of the social mediattitude we are all living in. We need to differentiate ourselves, feature our skills and always make sure we’re ahead of the crowd. The Lily helps you do just that. For $499 (pre-ordering price, $999 otherwise) the Lily will help you display your sport skills and show your Facebook friends you’re the best in class.
Posted in Innovation.
