Phantom

History

Frank Wang was still a student at Hong Kong University of Science and Technology when he and three friends moved to Shenzhen, China, and founded DJI in 2006. DJI got its start building helicopter drones, but Wang decided to expand into quadrotors. The company began developing its own technology, including motors, a flight-control system, and gimbals. The idea was to produce the most agile, stable, and reliable drones possible. DJI introduced its first quadrotors in 2011 (by then, Wang was the last of the founders remaining at the company), targeting specific applications, including cinematography, agriculture, industrial inspection, construction, and emergency response. Originally priced at US $629, the Phantom was DJI's first fully assembled model and among the first drones designed explicitly for consumers. The original Phantom and subsequent Phantom models have helped DJI dominate the consumer drone segment with more than 70 percent of market share.