Skydio X2 Shipping Now – and Introducing Skydio Cloud

A major news announcement from US drone maker Skydio introduces the Skydio Cloud: and says the highly anticipated X2 is shipping now.

Skydio X2 Shipping Now

“Skydio, the leading U.S. drone manufacturer and world leader in autonomous flight technology, today announced it is now shipping Skydio X2 drones with dual color/thermal sensors to defense, public sector and enterprise customers,” says the announcement.  “A new X2 configuration with a single wide-angle color camera for close up inspections is now available for pre-order.”

In the last 2 years, Skydio has received record-breaking funding – and the company has been racing to develop their U.S. manufacturing capability, despite the pandemic.  With the announcement that the X2 is shipping, Skydio is poised to rapidly gain market share, particularly in the public safety sector. “In just three months since announcing pre-order availability, Skydio has seen demand for X2 spike approaching 1,000 systems reserved across defense, federal and state agencies, law enforcement and fire departments, construction, engineering, and transportation companies,” says the announcement. “In addition, Skydio X2 was selected by the US Army for final integration in the Short Range Reconnaissance (SRR) program of record.”

By combining unparalleled ease of use and obstacle avoidance with a portable, lightweight yet robust airframe, Skydio X2 is rapidly becoming the solution of choice for a wide range of missions, including reconnaissance, search and rescue, security patrol, situational awareness, asset inspection, scene reconstruction and small area survey.

Skydio’s X2 drones come in 2 versions: the X2E for enterprise and public safety and the X2D for government customers.  ( The X2D version, developed with U.S. federal agencies, is a Blue sUAS solution. ) The X2 is based on Skydio’s renowned automation engine, and was a winner of the 2021 Best Innovation award at this year’s CES show.

Along with X2, Skydio has also begun shipping the new Skydio Enterprise Controller and Skydio Autonomy Enterprise Foundation for X2.  Price for Skydio X2 starts at $10,999 with Skydio Enterprise Controller and accessories.

Introducing Skydio Cloud

In addition, the company also launched Skydio Cloud, a suite of advanced cloud services and APIs.  Seamless integration with cloud services is a critical element for enterprise drone programs: but Skydio emphasizes that the data is securely stored in the U.S.

Skydio Cloud enables a new paradigm of autonomous connected flight operations by turning Skydio’s industry-leading autonomous drones into seamlessly and securely internet-connected devices with powerful cloud services. With Skydio Cloud, data can flow through the organization thanks to a set of robust APIs that allow direct integration with enterprise business systems for end-to-end management of flight operations, data analysis and security compliance.

Skydio Cloud runs on AWS – US Region cloud infrastructure, which ensures that data sent to the cloud never leaves the US, and include the following services:

• Skydio Fleet Manager (available in limited early access) for federated management for distributed drone operations

• Skydio Media Sync (available in limited early access) for seamless upload and management of flight media

• Skydio Streaming (coming soon) for real-time video aerial intelligence from  from any browser or mobile device

• Skydio Remote Ops (coming soon) for groundbreaking teleoperation with the AI-powered obstacle avoidance of Skydio Autonomy

“Skydio Cloud unlocks the power of drones for organizational use at scale. It provides a foundation for connected flight operations, providing tight integration between hardware and cloud-based software, and unlocks a broad ecosystem of new partner solutions via an open API,” said Mike Ross, Senior Director of Product Management at Skydio. “Bridging the drone industry’s hardware-software gap, our flight operations will be truly connected to a platform that will enable users to quickly collect the data they need, to effectively search through it, and to easily share it throughout their organization.”

Clients who have had early access to the X2 and the Skydio Cloud are enthusiastic about the solution.

“Since our effort’s founding in 2014, drones have become an important part of our operations, and being able to leverage Skydio’s autonomous flight capabilities is a key part of safe deployment. Skydio X2’s combination of autonomy with dual color/thermal sensor, longer flight time and extended wireless range will help us conduct aerial inspections more efficiently and with greater detail than ever before,” said Todd Graetz, Director, RPA/UAS, BNSF Railway. “Furthermore, we have been testing Skydio Cloud as part of the early access program and we are excited by the prospect of managing our vehicles, closely tracking our usage metrics and operating our distributed fleet.”