Aerodyne's Bet on Drone Data: Checking the Viral Story of Kamarul Muhamed

This is the first post in Malaysia, a new section of Bull Bear Market. It covers Malaysian companies, founders and markets that matter to people who build technology: who is growing, how they did it, and which claims hold up when checked.

We start with a story that spread on Instagram in May 2026. On 20 May, Catalist Media (@catalistmedia.my) posted a 66-second reel about Dato' Kamarul A. Muhamed (@itskamarul), founder of the Cyberjaya-based Aerodyne Group (catalistmedia.my, 2026). It drew about 10,800 likes and 128 comments.

The reel calls Aerodyne the world's number one drone company. In its telling, a chartered accountant turned software executive reads a PwC report in 2014, quits, and starts out with three people and his own savings. While Silicon Valley builds drones and China competes on price, he bets on the data: drones replace two-day climbs up telecom towers and survey plantations tree by tree, raising yields by 30%. Then come 21 acquisitions, more than 35 countries and a top ranking from Drone Industry Insights. The caption adds more than 10 million flight hours and calls Aerodyne hardware agnostic.

Most of this checks out. The report's date does not, the number one claim needs context, and we could not find the source of the 30% figure.

From accountant to drone founder

Kamarul was born in Kelantan; his father, a former soldier, ran a fishing business and his mother a food business (Hilda, 2024). He studied accounting in the UK and worked there as an auditor (Hilda, 2024). Back in Malaysia he joined an American software firm and rose to country manager for Malaysia and Brunei by the age of 29 (Pereira, 2024).

The reel compresses what came next. Kamarul left that job the same year, long before Aerodyne, and launched Malaysia.tv in 2003 and a production house, DKM2, in 2006 (Hilda, 2024). DKM2's drone unit shot aerial footage for documentaries. In 2014 he spun it out as Aerodyne, with seed capital of RM1 million (Noordin, 2019) and a team of three (BFM 89.9, 2024; Hilda, 2024).

The Edge's RM1 million figure comes without a source of funds, and we found no interview confirming it was personal savings. What is documented is that Aerodyne grew on its own cash flow until its first significant outside funding, from the Axiata Digital Innovation Fund, in March 2018 (K. Singh, 2021).

The PwC report came later

PwC's Clarity from above is dated May 2016 and was announced that month (Canadian Underwriter, 2016; PwC, 2016), nearly two years after Aerodyne was founded, so the reel's 2014 date does not fit. The Peak reports that the paper sparked his move into drones (Hilda, 2024), and a 2024 account of an interview with him also dates the projection to 2014 (500 Global, 2024), so the mix-up probably predates Catalist Media. The report did shape his pitch: raising money in 2018, he put the market at over US$127 billion (K. Singh, 2021).

That number is often misread. PwC's US$127.3 billion was not a forecast but its estimate of the 2015 value of business services and labour that drones could replace, led by infrastructure (US$45.2 billion) and agriculture (US$32.4 billion) (PwC, 2016). Kamarul later said the real 2020 market was under a quarter of the projection (500 Global, 2024).

The bet: data, not drones

Kamarul told The Edge that the production-house work was profitable but could not scale, so Aerodyne moved from pictures to data. Its first product, PRISM, used drone surveys to track progress and compliance on construction sites, including the RAPID refinery complex in Pengerang (Noordin, 2019).

By 2017, Kamarul says, he had concluded the business was about data rather than flying, and he calls Aerodyne "a data company first" (500 Global, 2024). AI followed from late 2018 (K. Singh, 2021). Its Vertikaliti software turns drone imagery into inspection findings for power grids, telecom towers, oil and gas sites, wind turbines, solar farms and ports (Aerodyne Group, n.d.-d). The flying itself is sold as a platform-agnostic service with no capital outlay for the client (Aerodyne Group, n.d.-a), and Aerodyne signs up hardware makers as partners, such as Germany's Phoenix-Wings in a 2025 agreement on delivery drones (sUAS News, 2025).

The logic is simple. Drone making is a scale game that DJI dominates (I. Singh, 2023). Clients want a defect list and a maintenance plan, not an aircraft, and inspections repeat every cycle. Kamarul said in 2019 that long-term contracts gave Aerodyne steady monthly cash flow (Noordin, 2019).

What the drones actually do

Telecom towers. In 2019 Aerodyne's main Malaysian client was edotco, with about 29,000 towers in the region. Kamarul said a manual inspection took more than a day per tower plus two months for the report; by drone it took an hour, with the report almost immediate (Noordin, 2019). That supports the reel's two-day climbs; the loose bolts and rust are its illustration.

Power lines, wind and pipelines. Thermal cameras spot overheating equipment, and Aerodyne said it processed more than 6,000 thermal data points a day by algorithm. A conventional blade check can stop a wind turbine for up to two days, against about an hour by drone (Noordin, 2019). On pipelines, sensors trigger drones that launch from docking nests (Hilda, 2024). The company claims 722,000 km of power lines and about 10,100 wind turbines inspected by December 2022 (Aerodyne Group, n.d.-a).

Plantations. Multispectral cameras read crop health, including early signs of Ganoderma, the fungus that rots oil palms, and maps show which blocks need more or less fertiliser; an Aerodyne director put the fertiliser savings at up to 20% a month (Noordin, 2019). Its Agrimor app books drones for spraying, seeding and mapping (Aerodyne Group, n.d.-b).

We could not find a study, case study or Aerodyne release behind the 30% yield increase. The closest figure is Kamarul's 2019 plan for a profit-sharing scheme to help plantation clients earn 30% to 50% more (Noordin, 2019). That was an aim, not a result, so for now the 30% is the reel's.

Growing by buying

Much of Aerodyne's growth abroad came through deals. BFM and The Peak both count 21 acquisitions, matching the reel (BFM 89.9, 2024; Hilda, 2024). Several were controlling stakes, with local management staying on:

The country count varies: one Aerodyne page says more than 35, as the reel does, while its homepage and recent interviews say 45 (Aerodyne Group, n.d.-a, n.d.-f; BFM 89.9, 2024). There is no public list. The 10 million flight hours is a company figure, reported as of June 2024 (Hilda, 2024).

Aerodyne is private, so its figures are its own. In February 2024 Kamarul told BFM that revenue was US$65 million in 2023 and that a listing could come as soon as 2025 (BFM 89.9, 2024); he had aimed for 2022 in 2019 (Noordin, 2019), and in 2023 said two to three years (Yong, 2023). No listing has followed. In July 2026 Selangor named Aerodyne among local firms involved in its drone-industry programme (Bernama, 2026).

Is it really number one?

Yes, in one league, for three years. Drone Industry Insights (DRONEII), a German research firm, ranks drone service providers in remote sensing and in delivery. Aerodyne rose from seventh in 2018 to first in remote sensing in 2021, 2022 and 2023 (Aerodyne Group, n.d.-c; Boedecker, 2022, 2023).

Three limits matter:

• It ranks service firms, not the industry. Drone makers are ranked separately, and there DJI leads (I. Singh, 2023). Aerodyne buys drones rather than competing with their makers, so beating Silicon Valley and the Chinese giants mixes two different races.

• Size and attention weigh heavily. DRONEII scores firms on size, growth, media attention and, where available, financial data (Boedecker, 2023). In 2022 it noted Aerodyne had twice the staff of second-placed Terra Drone (Boedecker, 2022). None of that measures profit.

• The streak may have ended. Terra Drone says it took the top remote-sensing spot in 2024 (Terra Drone, 2024). We could not find DRONEII's own 2024 or 2025 results, and Aerodyne claims first place only for 2021 to 2023.

The reel, claim by claim

What Malaysian builders can take from it

• Sell the result, not the machine. Aerodyne's product is the report. If you build a device, charge for the decision it feeds.

• Start with a big local asset owner. Malaysian utilities, telcos, oil and gas firms and plantation groups own thousands of assets. An anchor client like edotco can fund a platform you later take abroad.

• Ride commodity hardware. Staying platform agnostic let Aerodyne adopt better, cheaper drones without writing off a factory.

• Buy access, keep founders. Controlling stakes bought customers and local knowledge, and Grupo DR1's managers stayed on as co-owners.

• Size markets from the bottom up. PwC's US$127 billion measured replaceable work, not sales.

• Read rankings closely. Number one here means one category of one index for three years: a real achievement, more convincing stated precisely.

References

Aerodyne Group. (n.d.-a). Aerodyne Group: Drone tech, data tech & digital transformation. Retrieved October 19, 2026, from https://aerodyne.group/

Aerodyne Group. (n.d.-b). Agrimor. Retrieved October 19, 2026, from https://aerodyne.group/agrimor.html

Aerodyne Group. (n.d.-c). Awards & recognition. Retrieved October 19, 2026, from https://aerodyne.group/awards.html

Aerodyne Group. (n.d.-d). Critical infrastructure. Retrieved October 19, 2026, from https://aerodyne.group/infra.html

Aerodyne Group. (n.d.-e). Media. Retrieved October 19, 2026, from https://aerodyne.group/media.html

Aerodyne Group. (n.d.-f). Our people. Retrieved October 19, 2026, from https://aerodyne.group/people.html

Benjamin, E. (2018, March 8). Malaysian drone specialist Aerodyne takes up 60% stake in Danish firm. The Edge Malaysia. https://theedgemalaysia.com/article/malaysian-drone-specialist-aerodyne-takes-60-stake-danish-firm

Bernama. (2026, July 30). Selangor allocates RM500,000 to boost drone industry development. The Star. https://www.thestar.com.my/news/nation/2026/07/30/selangor-allocates-rm500000-to-boost-drone-industry-development

BFM 89.9. (2024, February 8). Aerodyne's production house origins, continued M&A appetite, Series C funding status, and IPO plans [Audio podcast episode]. In Open for business. https://www.bfm.my/content/podcast/aerodynes-production-house-origins-continued-manda-appetite-series-c

Boedecker, H. (2022, November 10). Best companies for drone services in 2022. Drone Industry Insights. https://droneii.com/best-companies-for-drone-services

Boedecker, H. (2023, October 24). Drone services: The top companies in 2023. Drone Industry Insights. https://droneii.com/top-drone-service-companies-in-2023

Canadian Underwriter. (2016, May 11). Global market for business services using drones valued at more than US$127 billion: PwC. https://www.canadianunderwriter.ca/insurance/global-market-business-services-using-drones-valued-us127-billion-pwc-1004091119/

catalistmedia.my. (2026, May 20). Dato' Kamarul A. Muhamed (@itskamarul), a former chartered accountant from Kelantan, Malaysia… [Video]. Instagram. https://www.instagram.com/reel/DYjcGG7xk3W/

500 Global. (2024, August 20). Daily Markup 1055: Kamarul is not afraid to pivot from drones to data to AI, his courage and vision is leading Aerodynes success. https://500.co/content/daily-markup-1055-kamarul-is-not-afraid-to-pivot-from-drones-to-data-to-ai-his-courage-and-vision-is-leading-aerodynes-success

Hilda, N. A. (2024, November 4). Taking flight: Dato' Kamarul A Muhamed on Aerodyne Group's breakthrough. The Peak Malaysia. https://thepeak.com.my/on-the-cover/taking-flight-dato-kamarul-a-muhamed-on-aerodyne-groups-breakthrough/

Kamarulzaman, N. Z. (2019, December 6). Aerodyne takes up 60% stake in US aerial intelligence company Measure UAS. The Edge Malaysia. https://theedgemalaysia.com/article/aerodyne-takes-60-stake-us-aerial-intelligence-company-measure-uas

Noordin, K. A. (2019, April 8). Cutting Edge: Thrilling, disruptive and game-changing. The Edge Malaysia. https://theedgemalaysia.com/article/cutting-edge-thrilling-disruptive-and-gamechanging

Pereira, A. (2024, June 15). Kamarul Muhamed of Aerodyne on his journey with drone technology. Tatler Asia. https://www.tatlerasia.com/lifestyle/gear/kamarul-muhamed-aerodyne-drone-technology

PwC. (2016). Clarity from above: PwC global report on the commercial applications of drone technology. https://www.pwc.com/gr/en/publications/assets/pwc-global-report-on-the-commercial-applications-of-drone-technology.pdf

Singh, I. (2023, December 12). Ranked: Top 5 drone manufacturers of 2023. DroneDJ. https://dronedj.com/2023/12/12/top-drone-manufacturer-ranking-2023/

Singh, K. (2021, April 17). Digerati50: Kamarul Muhamed - Malaysia's unstoppable world beater. Digital News Asia. https://www.digitalnewsasia.com/digerati50/digerati50-kamarul-muhamed-malaysias-unstoppable-world-beater

Singh, K. (2022, December 19). Aerodyne takes majority stake in Brazil's leading drone inspection player, Grupo DR1. Digital News Asia. https://www.digitalnewsasia.com/startups/aerodyne-takes-majority-stake-brazils-leading-drone-inspection-player-grupo-dr1

sUAS News. (2025, February 21). Phoenix-Wings — Landmark MoU with Aerodyne Group [Press release]. https://www.suasnews.com/2025/02/phoenix-wings-landmark-mou-with-aerodyne-group/

Terra Drone. (2024, December 16). Terra Drone secures top spot in global drone service provider rankings for 2024 [Press release]. https://terra-drone.net/global/2024/12/16/terra-drone-secures-top-spot-in-global-drone-service-provider-rankings-for-2024/

Yong, Y. (2023, May 12). BEYOND EXPO 2023: Malaysia's Aerodyne plans to raise up to $200M in Series C round; IPO in two to three years' time. TNGlobal. https://technode.global/2023/05/12/malaysias-aerodyne-plans-to-raise-up-to-200m-in-series-c-round-ipo-in-two-to-three-years-time/