ABOUT DRONEHIVE
Company Overview
DroneHive is the leading provider of expert services for aerial data collection.
We help corporations collect accurate aerial data, enabling them to make better and more efficient operational decisions. By using DroneHive to develop and manage aerial data collection, corporations don’t have to waste time trying to understand complex drone rules, regulations and safety.
Aerial data collection is especially useful in construction, energy, security, insurance, civil engineering, agriculture, real estate and property management – all industries that do inspection and surveillance regularly. DroneHive has been working with a major global technology company, a national industrial equipment firm, the world’s second largest solar company and many other organizations.
Based near San Francisco, DroneHive is led by CEO Paul Huish and aerial operations leader Devin Hedrick, who is a pioneer in using drones for commercial applications. With a nationwide network of more than 1000 professional drone consultants and pilots, DroneHive is ready to help corporations integrate aerial data collection into their business models.
Leadership Team
Paul Huish
CEO
Paul founded DroneHive in 2016 to fill the need that corporations have for professional drone expert services. He has more than a dozen years of experience in resource management in technical contract labor and staff augmentation, most of it for multinational corporations in heavily regulated industries. At DroneHive, he is responsible for company strategy and business operations. He also oversees the sales and marketing teams.
Prior to founding DroneHive, Paul helped build a global resource management firm supporting the highly-regulated drug and medical device manufacturing companies. In his eight years at Validant, he helped build it from a start-up to more than a $100 million in annual revenue. He is an expert at helping clients manage resources and create jobs without a long-term commitment during periods of uncertain growth.
Paul holds a B.S. degree in Finance from Lehigh University and started his career as an financial analyst on Wall Street. He is a certified remote pilot and spends his free time with his wife and son enjoying the outdoors.
Devin Hedrick
Senior Vice President, Aerial Operations
Devin has ten years of drone operations experience and is a pioneer in using unmanned aerial systems for commercial applications. He ensures that DroneHive delivers superb professional services to its clients.
In 2009, Devin founded Hover Effect and used remotely controlled single-rotor helicopters to lift cameras, thereby creating some of the first real estate marketing videos using drones. His work caught on and he was hired for many different types of aerial filming for television and films. He and his team were nominated for an Emmy Award for their work on “Polar Bears: Ice Bear” in 2013. He also worked with Oscar-winning director, Louie Psihoyos, on “Racing Extinction” and most recently worked on “An Inconvenient Sequel” with former Vice President Al Gore. In addition, he has been hired to shoot marketing content for commercial real estate firms, architectural firms and solar companies, among many others.
Devin is a sport pilot and was one of the first to obtain a Section 333 exemption, as well as a Part 107 certification. He grew up building remote controlled cars, boats and planes, and has always had an affinity for engineering. While studying for a graduate degree in film-making at the Academy of Art, he realized that he could incorporate his lifetime hobby into his career. He has an undergraduate degree in business from Southern Methodist University.
Willem Slor
Operations Analyst
Willem previously supported YouTube development as a research coordinator at Vaco. He hails from the Netherlands and brings a passion for data science and helping drone pilots jumpstart their UAS careers. He leads the recruiting and reporting necessary to help these pilots get more projects and ensures they're involved in the DroneHive community.
Willem previously worked for Vaco at Google, working on Youtube. He has a Masters degree in International Relations from the University of Amsterdam and is fluent in English and Dutch. He also knows a little German and is actively learning other languages. In his free time, he enjoys traveling and spending as much time as possible outdoors, playing soccer and attending the occasional happy hour.
Michael Walcker
Safety Officer
Michael is a native of southwestern North Dakota and attended the University of North Dakota where he earned a B.S. in Psychology with a minor in Aviation Professional Flight. He has been a professional pilot and flight instructor for more than 17 years accumulating over 7,500 hours of total flight time, 5,000 as an instructor, and earned the “Gold Seal” instructor designation by the FAA. Michael also received the Master CFI designation from NAFI in 2009. He taught in ab initio flight training programs for Korean Air, Japan Airlines, and EVA Air. Michael currently flies with a Part 91/135 operation with a small Bay Area corporate flight department flying both domestic and international flights. In his personal time, Michael enjoys leading an active and healthy lifestyle with his family.
Malinda Grose
Head of Accounting Operations
Malinda joined the DroneHive team in 2018. She has her undergraduate degree in Accounting and her Masters degree in Finance. While she loves working with numbers, she loves the great outdoors even more.
When she is not working, she can be found snowboarding, backpacking, or on her stand up paddle board with her family.
Peter Ning
Flight Operations Lead
Prior to transitioning into the UAV industry, Peter ran a consulting research and engineering practice developing and deploying innovative geophysical field instrumentation at remote sites to monitor, detect and forecast satellite communications disturbances cause by the ionosphere. He has designed wearable mobility aid prototypes for the blind, patient tuning systems for breathing pacemakers and other neurostimulator applications.
Shelly
Social Media Operations
Shelly began as DroneHive's first intern, and continued as a part-time intern throughout her senior year at University of California, Santa Cruz. She now holds a Bachelor's Degree in Psychology, and works full-time supporting recruiting and managing DroneHive's social media platforms. With a background in psychology, Shelly is passionate about helping others. More specifically, she loves to assist the pilots in DroneHive's network in finding new opportunities each and every day. When she's not in the office, you can often find her outside - whether that's on a hike, at the beach, or exploring a new city.
Select Members of Our Nationwide Drone Operations Team
Partners
The companies below are trusted DroneHive Partners.
Airovant provides end to end solutions in the construction and industrial verticals leveraging remote sensing, data management and visualization , and ROI driven analytical insights. We have provided scalable drone based data services throughout = North America including volumetric analysis, jobsite progress, solar analysis, topography services, and modeling to name a few. Our solutions enable safe, touchless remote jobsite management for security, audit, and review.
Dronitek Group is a recognized leader in UAS Remote Pilot licensing and industry specialized training including mapping, precision agriculture, structure inspection and emergency response. Dronitek also provides agriculture data collection and processing services, and is an authorized AeroVironment Quantix aircraft reseller. In addition, they are an authorized DJI factory UTC Enterprise training provider.
FlywheelAEC is a group of BIM for Infrastructure and Reality Capture experts with decades of experience in civil virtual design and construction. They leverage drones and other leading technology to improve the existing processes of their clients projects, addressing complex problems with innovative and cutting edge solutions.
Hummingbird Technologies is an Artificial Intelligence business that provides advanced crop analytics to its customers by using proprietary Machine Learning algorithms applied to remote sensing captured imagery.
Hummingbird’s expertise allows customers: to increase their yields, optimise chemical inputs, farm more sustainably and make earlier, more informed decisions.
Keystone Aerial Surveys is an industry leader in the safe and legal use of Unmanned Aerial Systems(UAS) as an inspection and mapping tool.
Scholar Farms has an extremely thorough training masterclass on how to use drones and capture and processing software to get the data needed for great results in plant mapping for agriculture, forestry, environmental consulting and more.
Skycatch is the #1 aerial analytics platform. Catered to the enterprise client, with the most prolific representation across the ENR Top 400. They provide a full stack solution for the construction, mining, and utility industries.
SKYDIO has created a fully autonomous camera that flies itself by combining artificial intelligence, computer vision, and advanced robotics into a tool that anyone can pick up and use in minutes.
SkyWatch.AI delivers drone safety and on-demand insurance as it’s meant to be. SkyWatch's mobile app empowers you to focus on flying with the best-in-class risk map, in-flight warnings and post-flight insights.
SLANTRANGE systems combine powerful analytics tools with accurate and reliable measurement sensors to deliver the most actionable and immediate crop information ever produced for agriculture.
The Unmanned Safety Institute (USI) is the industry’s most widely recognized leader in flight safety solutions for individuals, enterprises, and organizations focused on integrating and operating Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) for civil or commercial purposes.
Ostrich Air is a team of industry professionals working to deliver the ultimate spectator experience in the new and exciting giant racing drone sport.
vHive is the only solution that enables enterprises to deploy autonomous, off-the-shelf drone hives to digitize their field assets and operations.
Want to be a DroneHive Partner?
DroneHive is the best consulting and services partner for DaaS companies. By giving you access to our network of premier drone pilots, we enable you to more easily penetrate all markets across North America. Only the most professional pilots will be representing your brand and we guarantee the quality of our work.
Drone equipment manufacturers, software platforms providers and data analysts can all benefit from a DroneHive partnership.
To be a potential DroneHive partner, please contact CEO Paul Huish at phuish@dronehiveinc.com or 415-737-5595.
Philanthropy
DroneHive is using our drone expertise to benefit our community by supporting the organizations below.
The Flight To Remember Foundation is a nonprofit organization that provides remembrance flights for hospice patients across the country. Using drone technology patients are virtually "transported" to a meaningful location that they are longing to visit.
A 25-year-old regional public information magazine focused on the conservation and restoration of the San Francisco Estuary, and efforts to manage flooding, adapt to drought and sea level rise, and sustain habitats for fish and wildlife.
Sustainability
DroneHive cares about the natural environment on our planet. We plan to do our part to slow down climate change by minimizing our company’s environmental footprint wherever possible.
We have seen the negative impacts of climate change on our oceans as well as on land. A few of us have experienced natural disasters up close, including several summers of California wildfires which devastated humans and wildlife alike.
As a company, we want to help protect our earth. This is partially so that our children can enjoy the same splendor of nature and enjoy the healthy lifestyles that we do. But it is more than that. We believe we are all part of a larger interconnected whole, humankind, and we need to do our part to preserve what is left on our beautiful planet.
To that end, DroneHive has implemented a variety of programs focused on environmental sustainability. They include:
- Developing and distributing “Environmental Sustainability Guidelines” to our employees and network of over 1000 drone operators.
- Reducing waste, including at job sites, trade shows and events.
- Working remotely whenever possible to reduce carbon emissions.
- Partnering with a major environmental non-profit to provide volunteer drone work (with the support of our network of drone operators).
- Selecting and working with partners and suppliers who are like-minded about protecting our environment.
We understand these are relatively small steps to offset a major global challenge. We believe that every contribution helps and, with the collective power of our more than 1000 drone operators, we can make a significant impact for the future of our planet.