On November 23, 2017, the 5th edition of the global Unmanned Cargo Aircraft Conference took place at Rivalta di Torino, Italy. This conference organized by Jakajima was hosted by Avio Aero, a GE Aviation business which operates in the design, additive and traditional manufacture and maintenance of aeronautics engines. The event was supported by Platform Unmanned Cargo Aircraft.
The conference focused on UCA development projects, business models and potential applications.
During the conference, internationally renowned speakers from Avio Aero, International Transport Forum of OECD, German Aerospace Center, Unifly, Platform Unmanned Cargo Aircraft, Nimbus, Aha and Watify introduced UCA development projects and potential applications.
The titles of the presentations included: A policy perspective on the deployment of UCA | UTM, a key enabler for umanned cargo transportation | Unmanned Low-altitude Air Cargo: Towards Demonstration With A Specific Operational Risk Assessment | BVLOS drone delivery network in Reykjavik | Metaplano – Innovative Concept of Unmanned Cargo Aircraft and many more.
Below you can see the program of the conference:
| 9:00 | 9:30 | Welcome and Registration | ||
| 9:30 | 9:35 |  |
Opening, Moderator Pieter Hermans, Jakajima, More information |  |
| 9:35 | 9:45 |  |
Welcome and official opening, Riccardo Procacci, President & Chief Executive Officer, Avio Aero, More information |
 |
| 9:45 | 10:15 |  |
Paolo Salvetti, Sales Director, Product Growth Leader Military Advanced Turboprop, Avio Aero, on “UCA: preliminary Market Assessment & Business Model”, More information | |
| 10:15 | 10:45 |  |
Hans Heerkens, Assistant Professor, University of Twente / Chairman, Platform Unmanned Cargo Aircraft, The Netherlands, More information; Read the interview |  |
| 10:45 | 11:30 | Break and Coffee | ||
| 11:30 | 12:00 |  |
Alain Lumbroso, Economist, International Transport Forum of OECD, on “A policy perspective on the deployment of UCA”, More information |
 |
| 12:00 | 12:30 |  |
Koen Meuleman, Co-Founder & CFO, Unifly, Belgium, on “UTM, a key enabler for umanned cargo transportation”, More information |  |
| 12:30 | 14:00 | Break and Lunch | ||
| 14:00 | 14:30 |   |
Raffaello Cesoni, Business Development Engineer, Nimbus
Cristina Ballesio, Technical Engineer, Nimbus, |
 |
| 14:30 | 15:00 |  |
Maron Kristófersson, CEO, Aha, Iceland, on “If we can make it (work) here, we’ll make it anywhere…”, More information |  |
| 15:00 | 15:30 | Break and Drinks | ||
| 15:30 | 16:00 |  |
Florian-Michael Adolf, Researcher, Team Lead, German Aerospace Center (DLR), Germany, on “Unmanned Low-altitude Air Cargo – Towards Demonstration With A Specific Operational Risk Assessment”, More information |  |
| 16:00 | 16:30 |  |
Donatello Gianni, President, U-Avitalia, Italy, on “First flight and real project for future development of Cargo UAV by RTI U-AVITALIA / PIAGGIO AEROSPACE / BCUBE in partnership with ENAC, the Civil Aviation Authority of Italy”, More information |  |
| 16:30 | 17:00 |  |
Eleonora Zoboli, Consultant, Watify Consortium Representative, Watify Campaign, on “The Watify Campaign for the modernisation of European industry; opportunities of involvement for unmanned cargo aircraft institutional and business players”, Read more |  |
| 17:00 | End of Conference | |||