Will Drones Become the Toast of Napa?

For generations, Napa Valley growers have used workers on foot or tractors to apply nutrients and pesticides to the vines that produce grapes used in some of America’s most storied wines. Now Japan’s Yamaha Motor thinks it has a better way: drones. After testing its helicopter-like RMax for the past two growing seasons, Yamaha in December became the first company to win federal certification for a drone to be used as an agricultural aircraft in the U.S.

That was a coup for a company looking to the skies for growth after conquering land with motorcycles and the seas with boats. “The market [for drones] will expand as the agriculture industry embraces unmanned farming,” says Osamu Ishioka, former senior general manager of the company’s unmanned helicopter business. “Even as the population is aging and declining, no country in the world will abandon farming. This is why our unmanned helicopters will be in demand.”