Near the city of Nagoya, Takumi Yamaguchi pulls on a motorcycle helmet and sprints along an asphalt track before releasing a drone that looks like an 180-centimeter-long model airplane. It crashes shortly after takeoff.
Yamaguchi’s startup, AirKamuy, can afford such mishaps because it makes cheap, mass-produced drones — out of cardboard, of all things.
He sets off another test run, which goes much better. The drone buzzes around an artificial island not far from Nagoya’s main airport before returning for a landing. Engineers will gather data from the flights to adjust the device before producing the final model. If all goes well, the Defense Ministry will buy these so-called origami drones for missions that could include surveillance and swarm attacks in which the device would carry small bombs.
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