Three young engineers who are finishing their studies at the Polytechnic University of Valencia have designed an autonomous drone to extinguish forest fires that is equipped with an extinguishing agent, a project that has been the winner of a stay in Silicon Valley (California). , United States) of an entrepreneurship program.
Entrepreneurs Laura Sempere Agulló (Elche, Alicante), Pablo José Gómez Segura (Murcia) and Cosmin Ionescu (Almería) created the start-up company Utopia, a name they reserved for “the most important project” of their lives after applying to several contests and that it has become the best of those presented to the CaixaBank imaginPlanet Challenge program this year.
In the summer of 2022, when there were large forest fires in Spain, they observed “the great catastrophe that climate change represents” and began to think about what innovation they could come up with in this problem.
Each one with their specialty -Pablo in hardware and electronics, Laura in aerial robotics and Cosmin in computer science and artificial intelligence-, the idea began to develop in their heads as a viable project and they got down to work, according to what they told EFE.
They visited the Torrejón de Ardoz military base (Madrid) and a seaplane pilot explained the problems of fighting forest fires from the air at night. “They go to sleep and don’t know if the fire will be bigger the next day” because they can’t fly at night, they say.
They also contacted fire brigades and other professionals to find out how a collaboration between business and university could be started, and two professors from the UPV validated the idea of ??the project.
The drone will be fixed-wing, not propellers; It will allow a maximum load of 25 kilos and will be equipped with an extinguishing agent, a part that is yet to be determined and for which they are trying to contact a chemical expert.
It will be an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), as opposed to the manned ones currently used for firefighting, a system that endangers human lives and has a very long reaction time.
Until now they have carried out the artificial intelligence part, a microchip in which they have invested 400 euros – “what we can afford as students”, they say -, and the rest is yet to be developed.
This autonomous drone assesses the risks in the area, the danger in the perimeter and launches an extinguishing agent on the fire, all through artificial intelligence.
The project will travel to Silicon Valley thanks to the entrepreneurship program imaginPlanet Challenge, promoted by CaixaBank, aimed at young people who want to develop entrepreneurial ideas that help combat climate change.
The main objective of the imaginPlanet Challenge is to help create projects that seek to generate a positive impact on the planet and give a voice and tools to a generation of young people with environmental awareness and entrepreneurial concerns, sources from CaixaBank have explained to EFE.
In January of this year, the training phase began and throughout the first semester, the imagin digital services platform has been offering telematic sessions and training pills on sustainability and entrepreneurship, conferences at universities throughout the country, as well as access to tools and resources to help participants shape their ideas through the Lombard method, based on “Design Doing”.
After the formation, the teams presented their ideas and the ten best went to the final held last Thursday in Barcelona.
The winning team, Utopia, will have the opportunity to enjoy a stay in Silicon Valley, specifically at the Imagine Creativity Center, directed by the entrepreneur Xavier Verdaguer.
There they will participate for ten days in an incubation program for their project and will visit companies such as Netflix, Google HQ, Instagram, Twitter or IDEO, and will receive training from Stanford and Berkeley universities.
In September, the winning team will present their project in a “Demo Day” format session before investors and leading organizations in the entrepreneurial ecosystem. The project will also have the support of imagin in the acceleration phase to ensure that it goes ahead and becomes an initiative capable of generating a positive impact on the planet.
This third edition of the project has closed with more than 2,500 participants, 652 teams and a multitude of large projects and ideas with a positive impact, according to the entity.
“It opens up opportunities for us,” the three 22-year-olds say that they will be able to meet other entrepreneurs related to the drone sector, show their project to investors and further validate their idea.
The Utopia team, which was already proclaimed winner of the last edition of the Dream Big UPV, will travel to California in a few days to stay in the incubation program, which will take place from July 5 to 19.
