Irish drone delivery company Manna Air Delivery think South Western USA is the battleground for everything drone delivery – and Manna wants in on the melee.
Take the instance of Tulsa in Oklahoma, where Manna reckons about ninety percent of the population will be able to order deliveries by autonomous drone within the next year, obviously with Manna being the company to make those deliveries.
Last week, Manna said it was suspending its operation in Ireland so it can begin a push into markets where drone laws are progressing alongside the technology; including the south west of USA.
The Irish-founded and headquartered startup said it would be flying orders from partners such as DoorDash, McDonald's and Uber Eats within the next two months and operate from 40 bases across Oklahoma's second most populous city by mid-2027, executive chairman Kenny Jacobs told Reuters on the sidelines of the launch of the company's first full-scale US operation..
"This part of the US, Oklahoma, Texas, states around here will really be the battleground for scaling up and proving all types of drone delivery globally," said Jacobs.
"The technology is proven. Now it's about the commercial scalability and showing how quickly you can open up bases and deliver all types of things."
Manna, which is seeking to compete with Zipline, Alphabet's Wing, Amazon's Prime Air and other startups in the US, has completed more than 300,000 deliveries, mainly in its home market of Ireland where it recently paused services, citing the absence of clear national planning regulations.
Jacobs anticipates no such hurdles in the US and said he would be amazed if Manna does not expand into another US city this year, citing other parts of Oklahoma, nearby Texas and Arizona as attractive destinations.
The company can scale quickly at a low capital expenditure cost per base given each local launch site is no bigger than the size of four car parking spaces, Jacobs said.
Manna, which raised $50 million in Series B funding earlier this year, hopes to expand into Britain by early 2028 with its plans to begin pushing into the Middle East in the United Arab Emirates potentially progressing before that, Jacobs added.