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INDUSTRY FACT FILE · DRONES, ROBOTICS & AUTONOMOUS SYSTEMS

Main Products and Services in Drones, Robotics and Autonomous Systems

What India's drone and component makers, drone operators, robotics and warehouse automation firms, autonomous delivery businesses and fleet software providers deliver, the systems behind each, and where those systems create cyber and compliance exposure.

In this document

1. How drone and robotics businesses create value

2. Products and services by organisation type

3. The aerial layer: drones, links, navigation and ground control

4. The ground layer: robots, warehouses and fleet platforms

5. The systems behind the products and services

6. Trends that change the attack surface

7. Mapping operations to Codec Networks engagements

1. How drone and robotics businesses create value

Revenue stream	How it works	Security relevance
Drone and component sales	Sale of airframes, flight controllers, payloads and spares to enterprises, government and service providers	Firmware integrity, supply chain, product vulnerability handling
Drone services	Survey, mapping, inspection, spraying and monitoring sold per hectare, per kilometre or per project	Ground station security, imagery protection, pilot accounts
Delivery and logistics services	Per-flight or contract fees for medical, parcel and remote-area delivery	Link and navigation resilience, fleet console and API security
Robotics systems and integration	Robot cells, AMR fleets and warehouse automation sold as projects or robots-as-a-service	OT segmentation, vendor access, fleet server resilience
Software subscriptions	Fleet management, mission planning, analytics and traffic management platforms	Multi-tenant isolation, cloud security, API abuse
Training and support	Remote pilot training, maintenance contracts and remote support	Training records integrity, remote support tunnels, insider risk

2. Products and services by organisation type

Organisation type	Main products and services	Key systems
Drone manufacturers	Agricultural, survey, logistics and surveillance drones, with ground control apps and update services	Flight controllers, firmware, build and signing pipelines, update servers
Component and payload makers	Flight controllers, radios, cameras, LiDAR, thermal and multispectral sensors	Embedded firmware, SDKs, calibration tools, supplier portals
Survey and inspection operators	Mapping, corridor and asset inspection, digital twins and reports	Ground control stations, imagery storage, processing software, client portals
Agricultural drone services	Spraying, seeding and crop monitoring for farmers and FPOs	Pilot phones and apps, booking platforms, spray and field records
Delivery and autonomous inspection fleets	Scheduled and on-demand flights, docked drones and remote operations	Fleet cloud, LTE or satellite links, docks, remote operations centres
Robotics and warehouse automation firms	Robot cells, AMRs, sorters, goods-to-person and service robots	Robot controllers, ROS, fleet managers, WMS integrations, vendor access
Fleet and traffic software providers	Mission planning, fleet management, analytics and traffic tools	Multi-tenant cloud, mission APIs, identity, data pipelines

3. The aerial layer: drones, links, navigation and ground control

A drone mission starts long before take-off. Operators plan routes in a ground control app on a laptop, tablet or phone, check airspace zones and permissions on Digital Sky, load missions and geofences, and update firmware and maps, often from a manufacturer's cloud. In flight, the drone relies on its flight controller, inertial sensors, compass and satellite navigation to know where it is, and on radio links to send telemetry and video and receive commands; longer-range and beyond-visual-line-of-sight operations add LTE or satellite connectivity and remote operations centres. Every one of those elements is software and every link is a potential entry point: weak pairing or unencrypted links can be intercepted, an unmanaged ground station can be infected, and an update package that is not signed and verified can change how every drone behaves.

Satellite navigation deserves particular attention. DGCA's 2023 advisory circular describes jamming as interference that can cause loss of position information and spoofing as interference using false position signals, and the government's December 2025 reply to Parliament confirmed spoofing near Delhi's airport and interference reports from six other major airports. Drones that rely heavily on satellite positioning need cross-checks with other sensors, integrity monitoring and fail-safes that bring them down safely when position becomes unreliable. Testing those defences is legitimate only when it is authorised and carried out in controlled environments, coordinated with the customer and any required regulatory permissions, because generating interference outside such conditions is unlawful and dangerous. Imagery is the other high-value asset: survey and inspection flights capture power stations, pipelines, plants, rooftops and people, and the files often move through shared folders, laptops and client portals with less protection than the drone itself.

4. The ground layer: robots, warehouses and fleet platforms

On the ground, robotics firms deliver industrial robot cells, autonomous mobile robots, sorters and goods-to-person systems, and service robots for hospitals, hotels and offices. A typical warehouse deployment connects robots over Wi-Fi to a fleet manager that assigns tasks, which in turn talks to the customer's warehouse management system; vendors often keep remote support access to tune and maintain the fleet. Industrial robot cells connect robot controllers, programmable logic controllers, safety systems and engineering laptops. Many robots run on middleware such as ROS, whose first generation had no built-in authentication or encryption and whose security extensions in ROS 2 depend on careful configuration. The 2025 Bluetooth setup flaw disclosed in several commercial quadruped and humanoid robots showed how a single design shortcut, hard-coded keys, can expose a whole product line to nearby attackers.

Fleet and traffic software ties these worlds together. Cloud platforms plan missions for many operators, push updates, stream telemetry and video, store imagery and integrate with customers' systems and with Digital Sky. That makes them highly efficient and highly concentrated: a broken authorisation check in one API, a leaked administrator credential or an exposed storage bucket can affect every tenant at once, and an attacker who controls a fleet console may be able to change missions, geofences or updates. These platforms also hold the evidence that regulators, insurers and customers ask for after an incident, such as flight logs, permissions and telemetry, so their integrity and retention matter as much as their availability.

Highest-risk moments

Releasing a new firmware version or update server, onboarding a new component or SDK supplier, moving to beyond-visual-line-of-sight, docked or delivery operations, connecting a robot fleet to a customer's warehouse systems, opening vendor remote support, launching a new fleet platform release or API, responding to tender security questionnaires, preparing for type certification, peak seasons for spraying, delivery and fulfilment, and staff exits from engineering or operations roles are where drone and robotics incidents typically begin or escalate.

5. The systems behind the products and services

Title: Figure 2: Where cyber risk sits across the drone and robot lifecycle. - Description: Figure 2: Where cyber risk sits across the drone and robot lifecycle.

Figure 2: Where cyber risk sits across the drone and robot lifecycle.

Product / service	Systems that deliver it	Key cyber and compliance touchpoints
Design and build	Firmware source, build servers, signing keys, component suppliers	Secure SDLC, code signing, SBOMs, supplier provenance
Certification and registration	Type certification evidence, UINs, Digital Sky accounts	Record integrity, account security, evidence handling
Mission planning	Ground control apps, laptops, tablets, pilot accounts	Device hardening, app testing, MFA, shared account removal
Flight and operation	Flight controller, radio links, GNSS and sensors, autonomy software	Link security, navigation cross-checks, tested fail-safes
Fleet and robot management	Fleet cloud, OTA updates, robot controllers, fleet managers, vendor access	Cloud and API testing, segmentation, remote access control
Data and reporting	Imagery, video, maps, flight logs, client portals	Access control, DPDP minimisation, retention and log integrity

6. Trends that change the attack surface

Trend	What is changing	Security implication
Beyond visual line of sight and docks	Remote operations centres run drones from docks over LTE or satellite links	Fleet consoles and links become safety-critical
GNSS interference near airports and borders	Reports of spoofing and interference at Indian airports in 2025	Navigation cross-checks and authorised resilience testing needed
Trusted supply chains	Buyers and other countries restrict components and drones on security grounds	Provenance evidence and SBOMs become selling points
Robots-as-a-service	Vendors run and support robot fleets remotely for customers	Vendor access and fleet server security matter more
Autonomy and AI perception	Drones and robots navigate and decide with machine learning models	Model integrity, data quality and safe fallbacks
Product security regulation abroad	EU CRA and RED requirements reach connected products sold in Europe	Vulnerability handling and secure updates become obligations

7. Mapping operations to Codec Networks engagements

If the organisation operates…	Recommended starting engagement
A drone or component manufacturing business	Firmware and update security review, build pipeline and signing key review, supply chain provenance assessment
Survey, inspection or agricultural drone services	Ground control and pilot device testing, imagery storage review, DPDP data handling review
Delivery or autonomous inspection fleets	Fleet cloud and API VAPT, link security testing, authorised navigation resilience testing, SOC
Robot cells or warehouse automation	OT and robot cell assessment aligned with IEC 62443, AMR fleet and vendor access review
A fleet, ground control or traffic software platform	Multi-tenant API and cloud testing, secure SDLC review, vulnerability disclosure process
Products sold into export markets	EU CRA and RED readiness review, product security incident response, SBOM programme

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Note: Descriptions are general and based on public information available as of October 2026. Systems and exposures differ by organisation, product, operation, permissions and agreements in force. Navigation resilience testing is described only as authorised testing in controlled environments, coordinated with the customer and any required regulatory permissions.