Six years ago the Quaternium startup made a revolutionary breakthrough developing the first hybrid fuel-electric drone ever. This drone was inspired by hybrid cars from the automotive industry. In 2015 the company made a disruptive flight of three hours and 10 minutes with its multirotor HYBRiX, crushing all previous flight-time records. Since then, the achievements of hybrid drones have not stopped growing.
A new category of drones has emerged with the promise to unlock demanding commercial applications. Hybrid multirotors multiply flight time more than 10 times compared to electric solutions.
Its experimental version of its new drone HYBRiX 2.1, weighed 25 kg.
It took off at 08:52 am in Valencia, Spain, and landed at 17:02 pm. Performing a stationary flight of 490 minutes. With this breakthrough, Quaternium set the New World Record of Endurance with the longest hybrid-drone flight on Earth. HYBRiX´s flight in Spain lasted nearly one hour more than the previous flight record, from Richen Power.
The company has published
Most multicopter drones in the market offer flight times ranging from 25 to 40 minutes, forcing the pilot to carry multiple batteries to the field while losing most of their time charging them.
CHART: Flight time of most popular multirotor drones compared to HYBRiX.
HYBRiX project is supported by the European Union through their innovation program Horizon 2020, which fosters disruptive projects in innovation, excellent science and industrial leadership. The project has also received multiple Awards by institutions such as AUVSI, CDTI, or the Spanish Government.
