Shenzhen Dajiang Innovation Technology Co., Ltd.,（DJI） is founded in 2006 by a team of talented and devoted professionals who are highly experienced in robotic engineering, including Dr. Li Zexiang, a world famous professor in robotics and control. DJI have doing years of researches in Unmanned Aerial Vehicle dealing with designing, manufacturing and system integration of autonomous helicopter control system. Now DJI has launched the 3rd generation of autonomous helicopter control system - XP3.1 series. DJI’s highly professional and innovative team make XP3.1 of exceptional performance and able to perform even for most demanding tasks. Deferent model of XP3.1 covers a variety of market from hobby to professional applications.
The Beginning
It all started with one word, interest.
Year 2004, in HKUST, based on the knowledge of model helicopters, few undergraduates started their final year project on Control of UAV Helicopters. This choice was not about profits or prospects, but to do something they were really interested in.
So it began.
The Prototype
After much effort, the final year project didn’t achieve what was expected, nor did it have a good grade. Maybe it’s like most researches, one success is the result of a thousand attempts. After graduation, the UAV group pursued their studies as post-graduates, while making time to continue on the UAV project. Try, not working, then try harder.
January, Year 2006, for the first time, they enabled the auto-hovering function.
Looking back, the moment didn’t strike as emotional as imagined, strange thing.
The Product
Success in auto-hovering became the foundation and motivation for further researches, and the need for a real product came into focus. In June, Year 2006, the first generation product, XP 1.0 was born. This development encouraged greatly the spirit, and the team decided to promote the product more widely. During that year, we joined in the China High Tech Fair, as well as the Zhuhai Aero Model Expo.
The exhibitions led to one decision, start our own company!
The Start-up
So there came Dajiang Innovations (DJI).
Interest and ambition suddenly became a real career, and the pressure of starting our own business became a strong motive. The newly born company was only able to humble at a cheap-rent apartment, but if you were looking for the last lit window, that would be us.
After half a year, DJI controller enabled beyond-visual-range flying for the first time, while launching a second product, XP 2.0. Some industrial enterprise started to purchase from us, and their support and trust became our crutch in times of huge pressure.
The company started with interest, and we believed that profits should never be the sole purpose of a good invention or innovation. We steadily pushed our products to the market, regardless of the early-stage financial squeeze on technology developments, while joining in quite a few social events. In May, Year 2008, after the Sichuan Earthquake, DJI sent several UAV Helicopters, equipped with our controller products, and took thousands of HD photos of the stricken area, some of which became crucial for disaster analysis.
The Revolution
There seemed to always have some peculiar revolutions in the industrial world. When battery technology made a break-through, the new situation of electrical-powered instead of fuel-powered UAV Helicopters was settled overnight. Being able to avoid some implicit problems of fuel-powered UAV, precision UAV controllers seemed to have a natural bond with electrical-powered UAVs.
In August, Year 2008, DJI developed our first electrical-powered UAV Helicopter, EH-1.
The Milestone
Time seemed to linger while building a business, but looking back, it all happened in a flash. It took us a year and a half to develop from the second generation product XP 2.0, to the third generation, XP 3.1, with countless difficulties and some weak moments. But we lived and loved it, and we insisted on it.
The result of insistence? That would be enhanced technology strength, new generation of products, and a wider market. Since the launch of XP 3.1, we have experienced an exponential rise of sales. We never took profit as the sole purpose of our innovation and invention, but now, it seemed unavoidable.
The Challenge
After years of mixed difficulties and success, our ideals and values became clear. What we want is not only a successful business, but also to achieve better and better technology.
In June, Year 2009, DJI started a project to challenge Mount Everest, and went deep into the plateau. Our technology was put to a test of severe climatope, with strong wind, low temperature, high altitude, and thin air, and showed great performance in stability. The whole project was conducted in major areas of south Tibet, including Lake Yamdrok, Shigatse, Yumbu Lakang, and Everest Base Camp, and went highest to an altitude of 5,600 meters. The journey was recorded with fun photos and videos, together with precious flight data, to provide for the preparation for further technology developments.
Now we are planning a new challenge for next year, which is in the Great Canyon of Brahmaputra River. The idea is to integrate vision recognition system and other new technologies into our UAV controller, and let the UAV Helicopter automatically fly through this most beautiful Canyon in the world.
The Future
It is said that engineers lack humanistic spirit; that may not be true. These few years not only trained us to be mature mentally, or more skillful professionally, but also taught us to harvest joy, and to understand life. In a way, we found home here. And for DJI, there’s still a long way ahead, pursuing ideals and taking challenges should be a life-time topic, and we will consistently attract more and more talents by our faith, our ambitions and our values.
Our story? ^_^ To be continued…
