RIGA, LATVIA – SPH Engineering, a leading developer of drone-based solutions for surveying, inspection and mapping, today announced the opening of applications for the Global Drone Operations Awards 2026. The international recognition program is designed to recognize advanced drone operations that solve complex field challenges in industrial, scientific, and engineering environments.
The launch comes as the drone industry enters a more mature stage. In many sectors, the question is no longer whether drones can capture images or create maps, but how they can support difficult field decisions with reliable data. From mineral exploration and methane inspection to construction monitoring, subsurface investigation, and academic research, drones are increasingly being used in places where traditional fieldwork can be slow, expensive, hazardous, or operationally complex.
Yet many of the strongest examples of advanced drone work remain largely invisible outside individual project teams, client reports, or research documents. SPH Engineering created the Global Drone Operations Awards to bring these projects into the wider industry conversation and help define what professional drone operations can deliver beyond routine mapping.
“Drones are no longer just cameras in the sky,” said Alexey Dobrovolskiy, CEO of SPH Engineering. “In demanding industrial environments, they are becoming professional tools for collecting data that directly supports business and operational decisions. With these Awards, we want to recognize the teams proving what advanced drone workflows can achieve, and help more industries understand the value of these methods.”
The 2026 Awards will focus on four areas where advanced drone operations can have immediate operational value: Mining & Exploration, Oil & Gas, Construction & Engineering, and Academia & Research. These sectors were selected because field teams are often asked to collect high-confidence data in remote, hazardous, or expensive-to-access environments, where better workflows can reduce risk, improve data quality, and shorten the path from fieldwork to decision-making.
The Awards are designed to spotlight projects where drones are not simply producing visual records, but enabling more advanced workflows through specialized sensors, integrated systems, complex field execution, and measurable outcomes. The goal is to recognize not only impressive technology, but the practical impact of applying that technology in real-world conditions.
Submissions will be reviewed by an expert jury based on technical complexity, data quality, innovation, operational execution, business outcomes, and measurable impact.
Selected finalists and winners will receive industry recognition and visibility among drone, geospatial, and industrial technology audiences. Winners will also be invited to participate in the award celebration event in Budapest, Hungary, in October 2026, where the community will come together to exchange field-proven workflows, share lessons learned from complex operations, and discuss best practices that can help advanced drone methods move from individual success stories to wider industry adoption.
By highlighting proven workflows and measurable results, SPH Engineering aims to help industries see drones not only as mapping or imaging tools, but as practical systems for safer, faster, and more data-driven field operations. The Awards are intended to turn outstanding project achievements into shared reference points for the professional drone community.
Applications for the 2026 Global Drone Operations Awards are open now. Full category details, eligibility requirements, submission guidelines, and evaluation criteria are available at https://www.sphengineering.com/global-drone-operations-awards
SPH Engineering is a premier solution architect for drone-based surveying, inspection and mapping, combining flight software, advanced sensors, data processing and data management into unified engineering ecosystems. Its core technologies include UgCS for complex automated flights and precision LiDAR data collection, along with specialized payloads such as ground-penetrating radar, magnetometers, echo sounders and other sensors for demanding industrial and research applications.
SPH Engineering empowers professionals across mining, oil and gas, academia, construction, utilities and environmental monitoring to collect reliable and scalable data in challenging and remote environments by extending drone technology beyond conventional operational limits.
For more information, visit www.sphengineering.com.
