Alphabet unveils app to provide air-traffic control for drones

The company that brought you free digital maps and email wants to do the same thing for your drone.

Wing LLC, an offshoot of Alphabet Inc’s Google, on Tuesday unveiled a new app it calls OpenSky that it hopes will become the basis for a full-fledged air-traffic control system to manage the expected growth of this new class of flying devices.

According to to James Burgess, Wings Chief Executive Officer (CEO), it has been approved to manage drone flights in Australia, where it is free. Wing has been working on demonstration programs with the United States (US) Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and is also holding discussions with other countries on getting its app approved.