What do you get when combining the top recreational drone organization with one of the world’s leading global security and aerospace companies? You get the AlphaPilot Innovation Challenge by Lockheed Martin and the Drone Racing League (DRL). A challenge encouraging the best programmers, coders, and droners to create a completely autonomous drone.

While they have their headquarters in Bethesda, MD, Lockheed Martin employs close to 100,000 people world wide. They are focused on the development, research, maintenance and advancement of advanced technology systems. They are the recipients of three prestigious Edison awards this past year alone for their work in autonomy, satellite technology, and directed energy. In 2015 Nicholas Horbaczewski founded DRL out of NYC. They are the world’s premier drone racing company. Specializing in a combination of high end media and proprietary technology, they create mesmerizing 3D racing content. Through their innovation, what was once mostly a droner hobby, is now a leader in the future of sports with mass appeal.

Now the two enterprises are joining forces to find a way to create drones that will not only provide racing entertainment, but take drone technology to the next level to benefit the world at large. According to Keoki Jackson, Chief Technology Officer at Lockheed Martin, ” We are working to pioneer state-of-the-art, AI-enabled technologies that can help solve some of the world’s most complex challenges – from fighting wildfires and saving lives during natural disasters to exploring the farthest reaches of deep space. Now, we are inviting the next generation of AI innovators to join us with our AlphaPilot Innovation Challenge. Competitors will have an opportunity to define the future of autonomy and AI and help our world leverage these promising technologies to build a brighter future.”

DRL showcases the best drone pilots in the world. The goal of this challenge will be for teams to create a drone that can be autonomously flown against the best human pilots, and win! This is a multi year challenge with prizes worth over $2 million, and the team that first successfully out performs a human pilot will be awarded an extra $250,000!

They hope that by creating an exciting environment for this challenge, the best students, coders, droners, and engineers will be motivated to come up with the next generation of drones. These drones will not only entertain the masses, but hopefully help them in times of need as well.