About us

Name: Dronedesk
Brand: Dronedesk
Rating: 4.9 (339 reviews)

Dronedesk is a small independent company based in the UK. Read our origin story and find out more about our business philosophy and strategy.

Here's how Dronedesk came about

Hi, I'm Dorian - that's me (on the left) and my wife Martine, who supports me with our social media strategy - the Founder of Dronedesk.

Back in 2018 I decided it was time to jump off the corporate treadmill. I chose to train as a drone operator because I saw huge potential in this nascent industry.

I was over the moon when I gained my "Permission for Commercial Operations" (PfCO). But, I quickly realised that the massive amount of admin needed to plan even the simplest of flights was a real pain in the proverbial. I hate admin.

Because I had some coding skills, I started building web tools to make my life easier; scraping data from other sites and bringing it all together in one place.

I shared what I'd done with a few of my fellow PfCO trainees and they loved it because it made their life easier too. That gave me the impetus to build something more scaleable.

Dronedesk is born

I released the first beta version 1^st August 2019. Then it all went a bit crazy!

Amongst the 100's of commercial drone professionals who signed up to try that first version, a large number were kind enough to give their time, thoughts and input into how I could make Dronedesk work for them.

We haven't lost the momentum built up during the beta phase and every day we're working to continually refine and enhance Dronedesk.

In fact, I've personally put over 10,000 hours of development into the project and there's almost half a million lines of code behind the scenes!

Keeping Dronedesk affordable

I know how hard it is to get up-and-running and established as a drone operator - I've lived it. So, when I came up with Dronedesk as a concept, I wanted it to not only be an app that would help operators streamline and standardise their operation, but I also wanted to make it affordable.

I tried giving it away for free in the hope that ad revenue would cover the costs. That was, shall we say, an unrealistic ambition! So, whilst we no longer offer a free plan, we do have a really affordable "STARTUP" plan designed for new drone operators.

Scaleability

Dronedesk isn't just for small drone operations. It seamlessly scales for any size of team.

So it's also perfect for SME and Enterprise businesses. In fact, we have users running thousands of drone flight per year for hundreds of pilots. We even offer a white label option which is perfect for franchise companies and drone training companies.

Dronedesk is a cost-effective alternative to similar platforms. We're passionate about delivering unparalleled quality, functionality and value for money for our users. And that's why we're rated 4.9 on Trustpilot and 5 on Google!

What's next?

Dronedesk is what's termed a "bootstrap startup" which means the project is interdependently funded with no external investors or partners. That means that we run on a tight budget (there's no swanky parties at Christmas or expensive business lunches here!).

But the upside of bootstrapping is that we're not answerable to anyone other than Dronedesk's users.

That means we can steer the development in the direction users want it to go and not in the direction that would give investors the best return on their money.

That means we can continue to deliver a product that's sustainable, ever-improving and genuinely useful to its users.

Thanks for your interest in Dronedesk. I look forward to welcoming you on board so that you too can experience the daily joy of "less admin, more flying"!

Please give Dronedesk a try with a no-risk free trial and money back guarantee on me!

Fly safe!

Dorian Ellis
Founder and Director