This week’s news round up includes stories on a new partnership between Matternet and Swisslog for drone delivery between hospitals, research aimed towards detecting drones around critical infrastructure, and autonomous fire suppression. 

Matternet’s New Healthcare Partnership with Swisslog

Matternet has partnered with TransLogic, a Swisslog Healthcare company, to offer its drone delivery systems to hospitals through TransLogic’s existing sales network. Swisslog’s automated transport systems operate in more than 2,300 North American hospitals, including 18 of the top 20 in the U.S. The goal is to link in-hospital pneumatic tube systems with Matternet’s drones, which move supplies between separate facilities, creating a more automated end-to-end delivery network. The partnership will initially target hospitals in California, Florida, and Arizona during its first year, using Matternet’s next-generation M3 platform, which carries up to 11 pounds within a 10-mile radius.

The deal gives Matternet access to an established sales channel rather than requiring it to build each hospital relationship alone, and the companies may expand it to include installation, maintenance, and support through Swisslog’s field service team. However, the partnership doesn’t guarantee new customers or deployments. The M3 is still subject to development, testing, and regulatory approvals (the existing M2 is FAA certified), so the deal’s real impact will depend on hospital adoption and successful rollouts.

Protecting Infrastructure from Drones

Rowan University researchers are developing a new way to detect drones that threaten critical infrastructure such as power plants, stadiums, and correctional facilities. Because drones are now easy for anyone to buy, and traditional tools like radar struggle to spot them given their small size and low altitude, a team led by engineering professor Huaxia Wang is taking a different approach. Their system uses an antenna to capture the radio signals passing between a drone and its operator, which lets it detect and estimate the location of both. An AI algorithm then detects, classifies, and localizes the drone, based on the unique signal “signature” of each drone type.

To train the system, the team flies different drones on campus every week and plans to make the full dataset publicly available to other researchers. Wang is also working with AeroDefense, a New Jersey drone detection company, to refine and commercialize the technology. Together they’ve gathered data in real-world settings like stadiums, urban areas, and campuses, covering varied conditions such as different weather and times before, during, and after events, so the model performs reliably across diverse scenarios.

Seneca Teams Up with California Fire Department

The San Bernardino County Fire Department will become the first fire agency in California to deploy a fleet of autonomous, AI-powered, foam-spraying drones built by Seneca. Under a contract announced October 28, a strike team of five “autonomous suppression aircraft” and a Mobile Air Operations Base will be used to attack fires in remote or hard-to-reach areas before they spread. Fire Chief Dan Munsey said the goal is to extinguish 90% of fires before they grow beyond 10 square feet, calling the system a force multiplier that gets crews to high-risk areas faster and keeps firefighters safer.

The drones use onboard AI to coordinate with each other, allowing a single pilot to control multiple aircraft at once. Each carries enough water and concentrate to make 100 gallons of finished foam, so the five-drone team can deliver more than 500 gallons and reach a new fire in 5 to 10 minutes or less. Firefighters will begin training ahead of delivery, and the system is expected to be ready in the first half of next year, before the 2027 peak fire season.