Royal Dutch Shell PLC (Shell) has awarded a five-year, multimillion-dollar software contract to drone-based inspection specialist Cyberhawk
iHawk will become Shell’s next-generation visualisation software platform for all onshore, offshore and subsea assets, as well as all global construction projects.
The contract follows the successful integration of iHawk at a construction project valued at more than US$6bn in the USA, where it is now being used by more than 800 monthly users and has been rolled out at further sites in the UK, Central America and Africa.
Cyberhawk, which works with Shell since 2012, will support the digital transformation strategy of the supermajor, providing a central platform for all digital and visual data sources. In addition, iHawk will provide a fully enabled IoT solution by seamlessly integrating sensors from third parties and APIs developed specifically for Shell.
Following the completion of Shell’s drone audit earlier this month, the contract accompanies Cyberhawk’s global aviation authorisation within Shell. This permits drone-based inspections and surveys across all Shell facilities and marks Cyberhawk as the first and only drone operator to be approved to work on all Shell sites globally.
Chris Fleming, Cyberhawk CEO, stated, “We are particularly proud of the collaborative relationship we have built with Shell which has seen us provide a software solution that can be quickly adopted and adapted for a variety of assets, across many sectors including construction, upstream, downstream or subsea.
“This contract is further validation of the strength of our iHawk software solution, which has already been deployed by a number of customers to transform the way they manage their critical energy infrastructure across multiple sectors including oil and gas, electrical utilities and renewables. This deal further establishes our ability to set the gold standard in terms of data collection and asset management solutions.”
