Commercial drones are on the road to becoming everywhere, literally speaking, and thus may need some level of legality whenever they are seen flying in public spaces.
The Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International predicts that there will be an annual sale of 160,000 drones to businesses by 2025. With this in mind, Mike Brady, AIG's chief technology officer, believes that drones will become a huge deal in their insurance business and has thus decided to start selling drone insurance.
"All those drones will become a big deal for insurance companies because having that many of them flying around creates risk," said Brady.
The company has launched a series of drone insurance policies that will provide coverage for all types of accident. It has also included third party liability which can come in handy when the drone crashes into someone or into something. If the crash has caused physical damage to the aircraft, it will also be covered by the policy. This will include damages on the camera and other hardware that the drone is carrying. Moreover, the policy will give no exclusions in the event that something has gone wrong with the machine's on-board electronics.
"AIG has developed coverage solutions specifically designed for the exposure faced by remotely piloted, semi-autonomous, and fully autonomous aircraft," states AIG on its official site. "Whether through a dedicated, stand alone, unmanned aircraft hull and liability, or liability only, policy applicable to owned and/or non-owned unmanned aircraft, or through a liability only coverage available as an enhancement to a Lexington general liability placement, AIG has the capability and product to handle unmanned aircraft of any size operating in a wide variety of industries."
The insurance costs will depend on the type of coverage that the customer would need for his business. The company had so far created three distinct links on the site to allow them to understand further the background of a potential customer and the possible reason for obtaining an insurance. These include owners, operators, users of unmanned aircraft who are seeking new insurance coverage in using an unmanned aircraft; non aviation specialist broker who needed information on gaining coverage either for a new client or for an existing one; and aviation specialist agent or broker who already has an in-force business with AIG Aerospace.
