Google Gets Its Drone Business Back Off the Ground

Google has registered two new drones with the Federal Aviation Administration, prompting question marks as to what the tech giant actually plans to do with the UAVs: Mapping? Delivery? A new version of Waze?

The filings bring to mind Google’s failed Project Wing endeavor — the vaunted drone delivery service that failed to get off the ground — and whether or not its newest UAV’s intend to disrupt Amazon Prime Air.

First spotted by Engadget, Google’s filings for two drone vehicles named M2 and B3 are registered in Boulder, Colorado — where Google has an office — rather than its sprawling campus in Mountainview, California. The vehicles both weigh up to 55 pounds, according to the filing, and sound slightly reminiscent of the Octocopter drones that Amazon has been testing for quite some time, given their weight and maximum speed of 100 mph.

Back in 2014, Jeff Bezos gave an in-depth interview with 60 Minutes, where Amazon’s Ocotopter delivery drone, complete with exhaustive details about its specs, was made public for the first time.

Last March, Astro Teller, the head of Google’s Research Lab, Google X, announced the company had plans for a rebooted drone project after the failure of Project Wing.