XAG, a developer of smart agricultural solutions, has announced that it has partnered with Huawei to explore potential applications of 5G, AI and cloud computing in agriculture. The partnership follows the Huawei Cloud City Summit, at which Justin Gong, Co-founder and Vice President of XAG, was invited to give a keynote speech detailing the company's multi-layer smart agriculture solutions featuring drones, internet-of-things (IoT), and artificial intelligence (AI). XAG and Huawei have previously developed the Agriculture IoT System (XIoT), which uses intelligent sensors powered by Huawei's communication and HiSilicon imaging solutions to collect real-time meteorological and soil data, such as rainfall, wind speed, soil moisture and temperature, and capture HD field images to help farmers manage their lands more efficiently. Combining 5G technology with AI and cloud computing would enable new abilities in live video monitoring, remote diagnostics and on-site prescription for improved precision agriculture. For example, geographic and imaging data captured by XAG's surveying drones can be real-time processed in the cloud, while Agriculture Intelligence (XAI) can immediately analyse those data to generate AI prescription maps on site to achieve the Variable-rate Application (VRA) of the robotic systems.

We spoke to The Daily Beast to help make sense of ISIL's growing use of armed consumer drones in the conflict in Syria and Iraq. Meanwhile, we assisted The Verge in confirming that the jail sentence given to a Seattle man for crashing his drone during a parade was in fact unprecedented in the history of U.S. domestic drone use. A suspected U.S. drone strike in Pakistan killed two individuals near the border of Afghanistan. If confirmed, it would be the first U.S. drone strike in Pakistan under the Trump administration. The U.S. launched over 20 airstrikes in Yemen, targeting al-Qaeda in the Arab Peninsula.

Telecommunications firm Verizon has acquired Skyward, a drone operations management company. Skyward develops software for drone operators to manage flight tracking and logging, maintenance scheduling, and contract management. The drone startup will join Verizon's Internet of Things portfolio. Kenya's government has implemented regulations for commercial drone use. The Kenya Civil Aviation Authority will begin allowing businesses to import and use drones for a range of operations.