The company looking to build a statewide “beyond visual line of sight” drone network is preparing for the next step of testing.

The Northern Plains UAS Test Site will be performing operational testing of Vantis later this month. It will be flying drones in a commercial setting, such as pipeline construction or package delivery. Executive Director Nicholas Flom said he’s excited to showcase the network and will have a company in northwestern North Dakota this week to conduct tests.

“They want to come to North Dakota; they want to set up commercial operations. We’re going to show them around and start to get on a track in order to get them to commercialize their operations and really kick it off in North Dakota for them,” said Flom.